Hi, I agree with Emilians comments (have a look at the end of this mail) and I want to add that I like it to start with Friend-only API because then a potential user must become active to use it. The user asks me to be added on the friend-list and I get his e-mail and I can ask him for feedback in my answer. That is great. The main problem in the context of netbeans maybe is that it needs additional time that the netbeans repository is updated with the information of the list-change. Maybe other people are involved etc. But I am not sure if this is really a problem.
I am afraid, that an automatism which makes friend APIs public after some versions will produce more public APIs but with less quality. I like the situation that all public netbeans APIs are very stable and have good quality. And thats more important for me than having more APIs. But of course to have more APIs I will like too. The Idee Peter presents: https://stackoverflow.com/q/32555597/2999563 I like too. It can be a nice additional feature to be used in the friend APIs. The more and more stable the friend API will be, as less usage of @unstable annotation is used and if the last position of the @unstable annotation is deleted than it is time to make the API public. best regards Oliver > I think you are annoyed by friend APIs just because nobody cared through > time about those APIs to bring them to a public API. But that's just a sign > of no money / human resources poured into it, not a lack of automation or > other processes. > > If you somehow force people to reconsider friend APIs as they become public > in 2 releases then they will just stop using friend APIs and find other > creative ways via reflection, the global lookup, etc. So... you only > obfuscate the matter. > > Note that the Friend API is not only for NetBeans! You could also have your > own bunch of modules and defined friends among some of them, etc. I know > that some NetBeans friend APIs are quite juicy so I understand the > frustration but it's a frustration with the NetBeans codebase, not the > concept itself. > > --emi > > ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐ Original Message ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐ > > On 13 July 2018 2:11 AM, Peter Nabbefeld <[email protected]> wrote: > > Hello all, > > > > I personally don't like "Friend" APIs, as really I like the idea of an > > > > open, extensible IDE. > > > > From my point of view, Friend APIs make it difficult or impossible to > > > > extend NetBeans for personal use: > > > > - You have to ask for being added to the friends list. This is > > > > especially a problem, if You want to implement some private-use > > feature, > > > > e.g. for Your employer. > > > > - Alternatively You could depend on the implementation version; but I > > > > don't see how to do that, if You're using Maven. > > > > - Third possibility is just patching the modules to remove the friends > > > > and make the API public - very ugly, and You have to do it after every > > > > update.
