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IntelliJ plugin for a Design Pattern Code Generator

This project is to create an IntelliJ IDEA plugin that generates the template code for a user chosen design pattern and adds it to the existing Java project opened and loaded in the IntelliJ IDE. Additionally, the plugin also checks whether the class/interface names provided clash with any pre-existing type names in the project directory.

The Design Patterns covered are the 23 Gang of Four(GoF) design patterns, as presented in the book “Design Patterns: Elements of Reusable Object-Oriented Software”.

The implementation for code generation module was taken from this project.

Index

  1. About Design Patterns
  2. About JavaPoet
  3. Application Design
  4. Test Cases
  5. Instructions to Execute
  6. Results of Execution

1. About Design Patterns

Design patterns are the best practices that a programmer can employ to solve trivial problems while designing an application. Design patterns help in speeding up the development process as they provide a set of time tested, proven development paradigms. They provide an industry standard approach to solve a recurring problem. Using design patterns promotes reusability that leads to more robust and highly maintainable code.

The 23 Design Patterns are classified into 3 main categories:

  • Creational Design Patterns

    • Singleton
    • Abstract Factory
    • Builder
    • Factory Method

  • Structural Design Patterns

    • Adapter
    • Bridge
    • Composite
    • Decorator
    • Facade
    • Flyweight
    • Proxy

  • Behavioral Design Patterns

    • Chain of Responsibility
    • Command
    • Interpreter
    • Iterator
    • Mediator
    • Memento
    • Observer
    • State
    • Strategy
    • Template
    • Visitor

2. About JavaPoet

JavaPoet, a successor to JavaWriter, is a Java API for generating .java source files. It can generate primitive types, reference types (like classes, interfaces, enumerated types, anonymous inner classes), fields, methods, parameters, annotations, and Javadocs.

JavaPoet manages the import of the dependent classes automatically. It uses the Builder design pattern to specify the logic to generate Java code.

A HelloWorld program like the one here:

package com.example.helloworld;

public final class HelloWorld {
  public static void main(String[] args) {
    System.out.println("Hello, JavaPoet!");
  }
}

can be generated using JavaPoet as follows:

MethodSpec main = MethodSpec.methodBuilder("main")
    .addModifiers(Modifier.PUBLIC, Modifier.STATIC)
    .returns(void.class)
    .addParameter(String[].class, "args")
    .addStatement("$T.out.println($S)", System.class, "Hello, JavaPoet!")
    .build();

TypeSpec helloWorld = TypeSpec.classBuilder("HelloWorld")
    .addModifiers(Modifier.PUBLIC, Modifier.FINAL)
    .addMethod(main)
    .build();

JavaFile javaFile = JavaFile.builder("com.example.helloworld", helloWorld)
    .build();

javaFile.writeTo(System.out);

MethodSpec "main" is configured with modifiers, return type, parameters and code statements to declare the main method. The main method is added to a HelloWorld class and then the class is added to a HelloWorld.java file.

JavaPoet offers models for classes & interfaces (TypeSpec), fields (FieldSpec), methods & constructors (MethodSpec), parameters (ParameterSpec) and annotations (AnnotationSpec). It also generates the package folder structure for the output java source files.

The most recent version of JavaPoet available as of now is 1.12.1.

3. Application Design

To implement Design Pattern Code Generator(DePaCoG), I have employed the Factory Method, Template Method and Singleton design patterns.

The Factory Method, a creational design pattern, creates two basic abstractions: the Product and Creator classes. Both these classes are abstract and clients need to extend them to realize their specific implementations. This pattern is used when there is a super class with multiple sub-classes and based on user input a particular sub-class needs to be instantiated. The responsibility of instantiation of a class is taken from the user to the factory class.

In the case of DePaCoG, the DesignPattern and DesignPatternGenerator are the two abstractions I have chosen.

  • DesignPattern is an interface which declares methods for accepting and displaying the class names & package names from the user, generating java source code of the design patterns using JavaPoet and writing the java code into java files as output.
public interface DesignPattern {
    
    void displayClassNames(String[] classes);
    
    String[] setClassNames(String[] oldClasses);
    
    String setPackageName(String defaultPckgName);
    
    void createDesignPattern(String[] oldClasses, String oldPackageName);
    
    JavaFile[] generateCode(String[] classes, String packageName);
    
    void writeJavaFiles(JavaFile[] files);
}

There are 23 separate concrete classes(java files) to generate the java source code for each design pattern. Each concrete class implements DesignPattern. Interface DesignPattern provides the default method definition of all methods except the method generateCode() as the implementation of all other methods do not change according to the design patterns. Each concrete class of DesignPattern overrides generateCode().

  • DesignPatternGenerator is an abstract class which declares methods to display a menu of all available design patterns and invoking appropriate classes to generate a user selected design pattern.
abstract class DesignPatternGenerator {

    protected  String[] designPatterns;

    abstract void displayDesignPatterns();

    abstract void generateDesignPattern();

    abstract void designPatternFactory();
}

The field designPatterns declares all the design patterns available for creation. All the methods are abstract and are provided with the implementation in the concrete class Hw1DesignPatternGenerator which extends DesignPatternGenerator. The class Hw1DesignPatternGenerator also defines an additional method chooseDesignPattern(int choice) which takes in user’s choice of design pattern as input and instantiates an anonymous object of the appropriate design pattern class.

  • Advantages of using Factory Method pattern:
    • It provides an approach to “program to an interface, not an implementation”.
    • Through inheritance it provides an abstraction between implementation and client classes. It removes the instantiation of objects of implementation classes from the user/client code
    • It makes the code more robust, easy to extend and less coupled
    • New types of concrete products can be introduced without any modifications to the existing client code
  • Disadvantages of using Factory Method pattern:
    • For just creating a single instance of a particular concrete object the user might have to sub-class the creator, which complicates the hierarchy of creator classes
    • Makes the code difficult to interpret as all code is behind an abstraction that may also be hiding another set of abstractions

The Template Method, a behavioral design pattern, is used to create method stub and defer the steps of implementation to the subclasses.

The algorithm for generating design patterns has the following steps: display list of all design patterns, ask user which design pattern code is to be generated, ask for and set custom (or default) class names & package name, generate source file using JavaPoet and finally write into output files. The order of execution of these steps cannot be altered as the sequence is critical for the execution of the program. So here different methods are used to achieve the goal of generating the design pattern code. Steps like asking class names& package name and writing generated code into file are common for any design pattern whether it is a creational or structural design pattern.

This is where Template Method design pattern is useful. It helps define the basic steps to execute an algorithm and can provide default implementation of the methods that might be common for all or a majority of the sub-classes implementing the design pattern. The method is which defines an exclusive property of a design pattern can be overridden by the sub-class.

Template Method is implemented in the interface DesignPattern and its sub-classes. Interface DesignPattern provides the default method definition of all methods except the method generateCode() as the implementation of all other methods do not change according to the design patterns. Each concrete class of DesignPattern overrides generateCode().

Inside the interface DesignPattern:

JavaFile[] generateCode(String[] classes, String packageName);

Inside class Singleton which implements DesignPattern:

public JavaFile[] generateCode(String[] classes, String packageName){
        int i = 0;
        ClassName Singleton = ClassName.get("", classes[i]);
        MethodSpec constructor = MethodSpec.constructorBuilder()
                .addModifiers(Modifier.PRIVATE)
                .build();
        FieldSpec instance = FieldSpec.builder(Singleton, "INSTANCE")
                .addModifiers(Modifier.PRIVATE, Modifier.STATIC)
                .build();
        MethodSpec getInstance = MethodSpec.methodBuilder("getInstance")
                .addModifiers(Modifier.PUBLIC, Modifier.STATIC)
                .returns(Singleton)
                .beginControlFlow("if ($N == null)", instance.name)
                .addStatement("$N = new $T()",instance.name, Singleton)
                .endControlFlow()
                .addStatement("return $N", instance.name)
                .build();
        TypeSpec singleton = TypeSpec.classBuilder(Singleton)
                .addModifiers(Modifier.PUBLIC)
                .addField(instance)
                .addMethod(constructor)
                .addMethod(getInstance)
                .build();
        generatedCode[i] = JavaFile.builder(packageName, singleton)
                .skipJavaLangImports(true)
                .build();
        return generatedCode;
    }
  • Advantages of using Template Method pattern:
    • All the duplicate code/methods of sub-classes can be put together in the super-class
    • Client can override only certain methods of a large algorithm, so that the other components of the algorithm are not affected
  • Disadvantages of using Template Method pattern:
    • Sometimes client might have to change certain fundamental aspects of the algorithm and changing only certain fixed components of the algorithm might not suffice
    • If the number of components in the algorithm being modelled is large, it is harder to maintain the code

The Singleton, a creational design pattern, that helps in ensuring that a class has only one instance in a program while also providing a global access point to the instance. I have used Singleton to instantiate only one instance of the class Hw1DesignPatternGenerator so that in the client class DePaCoG the design pattern generating method is only called once at a time. The instance field in Hw1DesignPatternGenerator is lazy initialized.

Inside class Hw1DesignPatternGenerator:

private static Hw1DesignPatternGenerator instance;

private Hw1DesignPatternGenerator(){
    logger.info("Executing constructor Hw1DesignPatternGenerator()");
    generateDesignPattern();
}

public static Hw1DesignPatternGenerator getInstance(){
        if (instance == null) {
            instance = new Hw1DesignPatternGenerator();
        }
        return instance;
    }

Creating instance inside DePaCoG class:

public class DePaCoG {
    public static void main(String[] args){
        
        Hw1DesignPatternGenerator.getInstance();
    }
}
  • Advantages of using Singleton pattern:
    • It makes sure that a single instance is instantiated for a class
    • Helps to get a global access point to the instance
    • The object is only initialized when initially requested
  • Disadvantages of using Singleton pattern:
    • Sometimes singleton pattern can hide bad code design
    • It requires modifications to be used in a multi threaded environment to make sure multiple instances are not created by multiple threads

Actions of the plugin are added in the plugin.xml file as shown below:

<actions>
    <!-- Add your actions here -->

    <group id="DesignPattern.Generator.MainMenu" text="Design Pattern Generator"
           description="Design pattern generator">
        <add-to-group group-id="MainMenu" anchor="last"/>
        <action class="com.samujjwaal.designpatternplugin.GetUserInput" id="Get.User.Input"
                text="Choose Design Pattern" />
        <separator/>
        <action class="com.samujjwaal.designpatternplugin.OpenGitHub" id="GitHub.Actions.OpenProject"
                text="Open GitHub Project"/>
    </group>

</actions>

The class GetUserInput is used to initiate the plugin execution and extends AnAction. It overrides the method actionPerformed, which is invoked whenever the user performs the associated plugin action.

The class ChooseDesignPattern is used to create a JFrame with a ComboBox element(dropdown menu) to select a design pattern. The class extends JFrame and implements ItemListener.

Once the design pattern is selected, the respective design pattern generating class from hw1ProjectFiles is instantiated and a DialogWrapper class is also instantiated.

The class DPDialogWrapper is used to create a dialog window for the user to input appropriate class names and package names for the output design pattern files. It extends DialogWrapper class.

Method doValidate is used to validate the input in each text field. It returns a ValidationInfo object for a particular JComponent which fails validation. Every time the Ok button is pressed method doValidate is invoked.

The class OutputFileHandler is used to perform all file management and I/O operations of the plugin. PsiDirectory objects are used to retrieve the project root directory and set the output directory for the generated files.

Method createOutputPackageDir takes package name as input and is invoked to create the output directory.

Method checkClassNameClash takes a class name as input and is invoked to check if any class file with the given name already exists or not. The method returns a Boolean value.

A PsiFile is created for each generated output class file using PsiFileFactory. Each PsiFile is written into the root directory using runWriteCommandAction() method of WriteCommandAction class.

4. Test Cases

There are 3 test classes ChooseDesignPatternTest, DesignPatternTest and Hw1DesignPatternGeneratorTest, with a total of 7 test cases.

  • Test Case to verify appropriate hashmap is created for the design patterns
  • Test case to check correct design pattern key is returned for a selected design pattern from the hashmap
  • Test Case to verify only 1 instance of Hw1DesignPatternGenerator is created each time.
  • Test Case to verify correct design pattern file is executed when user inputs the choice of design pattern.
  • Test Case to check null is returned on selecting incorrect design pattern choice.
  • Test Case to verify generateCode() returns JavaFile[] object
  • Test Case to verify the generated java files are written successfully in the output folder.

5. Instructions to Execute

First clone the repository from GitHub.

Open and load the project as an IntelliJ IDEA project and press Ctrl twice to open the Run Anything window. Perform the tasks gradle clean test and gradle clean build. To execute the project, open Gradle tool window and select Tasks -> intellij -> runIde or perform gradle runIde in the Run Anything window.

Wait for a new instance of IntelliJ IDEA Community to open and create a new or open an existing Java project to test the plugin.

Alternatively on Windows the plugin can be executed by executing gradlew.bat runIde in the command line.

The plugin can be used via the Menu option Design Pattern Generator, located on the right end of the Main Menu bar.

Select Design Pattern Generator -> Choose Design Pattern.A new window is created within the IDE with a dropdown option to select the output design pattern.

By default Singleton design pattern is selected and will remain selected even when user presses Proceed without making a new selection from the dropdown.

After selecting a design pattern and clicking on Proceed, a new window is created to get user input for package name and class names of the output class files.

Default values have been provided in the text fields which can be overwritten by user input. If a text field is left blank(without any text) it will cause an exception.

If the user leaves the text field empty or inputs invalid class name then a validation info is showed beside the text field.

On clicking Finish if the class names given as input clash with existing class names in the output directory, then a message dialog is displayed and the clashing class names are highlighted in red. On again clicking Finish, if the name clash persists the message dialog is again shown otherwise the corresponding class files are generated.

After user is satisfied with the input values, press OK and the design pattern template files are created in the root directory of the project, under a folder with name as the package name.

A default.conf configuration file is present at src/main/resources.

If user selects Design Pattern Generator -> Open GitHub Project, then the GitHub repository of the Design Pattern Code Generator from HW1 is opened in the browser.

6. Results of Execution

Here is an example of config values to create Abstract Factory design pattern.

{
      designPatternChoice = "2"       //for Abstract Factory Method design pattern
      classes = ["Processor", "Intel", "AMD",
      "OperatingSystem", "ChromeOS", "Ubuntu",
      "LaptopFactory", "ChromeBookFactory","LinuxLaptopFactory"]
      packageName = "com.laptopAbstractFactory"
}

For above config input, the output files will be saved in the folder com.laptopAbstractFactory in the root directory of the loaded IntelliJ project.

The classes created are : Processor.java, Intel.java, AMD.java, OperatingSystem.java, OS.java, ChromeOS.java, Ubuntu.java, LaptopFactory.java, ChromeBookFactory.java,LinuxLaptopFactory.java

The image below shows the class diagram of the classes generated after executing the input values.