Code Generation

This preference determines whether SWT Designer attempts to use the existing code creation style already in a file to generate code. SWT Designer checks a file when it is opened in the editor to see if one style or the other is used. If only one of the styles is being used in a file, it will continue generating code in that style, regardless of what the other code generation settings. If no style is detected (no controls have been created yet) or if more than one style is detected, the SWT Designer will generate code as specified in the other settings.

This preference determines in which method components will be created by default (in the event that a suitable method has not already be defined for the current class). If the method does not exist, it will be created and a call to it added to the constructor for the class. Various default choices are provided to match the code generation patterns of other GUI builders.

SWT Designer supports a wide variety of code generation styles and can emulate most other Java GUI builders including NetBeans, JBuilder, the Eclipse Visual Editor, etc. Choose a Variable Generation style (Local or Field) and a Statement Generation style (Flat or Block). Many of the styles have additional options that can be set. Once any combination of settings is selected, you can see a preview of that code generation style in the Preview pane.

SWT Designer supports several Variable Generation styles including Local or Field.

In the Local variable generation style, each component is assigned to a unique local variable and initialized at the point of declaration. An option is provided to declare each variable as final. Note that component types marked as As Field on the Variables > Type Specific preference page will always be assigned to fields.

In the Field generation style, each component is assigned to a unique field and initialized at the point where it is first used. An option is provided to prefix each field reference with this.

SWT Designer supports flat mode and block mode generation modes.