New to Lightroom, Development Resource

[jsakhtar]

I just wanted to say hello. I am a new Lighroom user interested in exploring the SDK in my spare time.

I am the author of a Lua IDE tool, well it is a plugin to IntelliJ IDEA. It offers support for code completion, api documenation, and a whole host of other features.

While I am learning about the Lightroom SDK, I thought it might be nice to get to know everyone in the community, and see if there was anything that I could add to my tool to help improve the current workflows.

I guess first on my list will be to add the Lightroom SDK descriptions to the IDE so code completion and documentation will work. I can find this information on my own, but if anyone has any advice or knows of any trouble I may run into, Do let me know.

Thanks Again,

Jon

PS. Here is a link to some info about the Lua plugin https://bitbucket.org/sylvanaar2/lua-for-idea/wiki/Home

[DawMatt]

Hi Jon,

Thanks for dropping by! I started using IntelliJ because of your plugin and

have been quite happy with it. Definitely makes coding plugins much easier.

The API Reference in the SDK download should give you the info you need to

create those SDK bindings you refer to. It was on my TODO list for someday

but that day hadn't come yet. I certainly won't complain if you beat me to

it!

Would be happy to talk to you off list about how I've been using the Lua

plugin to see if it can give you some ideas. I'll contact you using the

details on the GitHub site.

Thanks, Matt

(Apologies for the brevity - sent from my Android)

[jarnoh]

I'm an old IDEA user, but I never though the Lua module was available for the community edition, thanks for the info!

I gave it a quick spin, but for some reason not even the built-in code completion worked (e.g. string or table module), though I do have stdlibrary directory in my classpath.  I'd also be interested in LR APIs, and I'd be glad to help with that.

[jsakhtar]

Well,

I am working making a simple LR plugin this weekend. I have already created completion files for the API's I could find in the docs. (It would really be nice if Adobe could just provide the API's and whatever they use to generate the docs - LuaDoc etc). That way I wouldn't have to scrape the HTML.

I am following the tutorials here:

http://www.assembla.com/spaces/lrdevplugin/wiki/Getting_Started

As an aside, I notice that the other suggested tool was EditPadPro. Interestingly, I wrote the Lua support for that editor as well, so I was happy to see that it was getting some use.

If anyone is interested in playing around with IntelliJ and Lightroom development over this weekend 3/24-5. I'll be on irc.freenode.net, nick: sylvanaar

I'm a LR plugin newbie, but I am trying to learn both how to write a plugin, and what would I could add to my tool to make LR development easier. So if you have any thoughts, feel free to ping me.

Thanks Again,

Jon

[areohbee]

HI Jon,

Thank you for the EditPadPro Lua support - I use it all the time - I was pretty entrenched by the time IntelliJ IDEA came along so never made the switch - should I???

PS - I'm the one who's done most of the lrdevplugin stuff at assembla.com.

Note: My subversion client has been broken for a while so the elare plugin framework is out-of-date there - please contact me for fresh code if interested.

Cheers,

Rob

[jsakhtar]

Hi Rob,

Well. I developed World of Warcraft addons for years using only EditPadPro. Now I use IntelliJ almost exclusively. I know that I like using it because I spend time on making it a useful tool for me to use. For other people, I always suggest they at least try it out. It has some nice features that you can use even if you don't want to use it as your primary editor.

One example is the source code formatter. It doesn't have any options, but it does a nice job at reformatting Lua source code, and since the IntelliJ editor is aware of Lua syntax and semantics, it is quite safe to use.

Even if you dont use it to write your code, you can use it to check your code for errors, style issues, and potential problems.

If you have a large code base, its makes navigating around very easy.

So, should you switch? I dunno. Should you try it, sure - you have nothing to lose.

BTW, did you upgrade to editpadpro 7? Since I had moved on to my Lua plugin for IntelliJ, I didn't really put much effort into the Lua support for EPP7. I use it myself on occasion for a quick edit, nothing more though really.

[DFBurns]

Jon - Curious if you ever made progress on a Lightroom plugin for IntelliJ? It'd be great to have.

Dave

[DawMatt]

Hi Dave,

This has been available for some time now. I've been using it for at least a year now and find it very useful. Just make sure that you don't upgrade to IntelliJ 12 yet as I'm pretty sure the plugin isn't quite ready for the changes introduced in that version yet.

Matt

[DFBurns]

Hi, Matt.

I was referring to the Lightroom-specific plugin mentioned in #3 above. I've been using the Lua plugin also but upgraded to 12 before knowing it wasn't compatible. If the Lua one were working, I might be interested in helping with the Lightroom-specific one.

db

[DawMatt]

OK, sorry. Hadn't picked that point up when I originally read #3.

[jsakhtar]

Hi Guys. The plugin has been updated to support IDEA 12. There was a major bug holding me back from releasing it.

I did create a Lightroom API plugin.  https://bitbucket.org/sylvanaar2/idlua-sdk-lightroom

If anyone would like to help out I'd love it.

Thanks!

Jon

[DFBurns]

Thanks, Jon.

I have the latest Lua plugin installed and just downlaoded the Lightroom API library. Can you straighten one thing out? You called it a Lightroom API plugin but it seems more like, from IntelliJ's point of view, that I should add it to my project as an external library. True?

I have some other questions about getting things working right. In general, where is the best place to discuss issues for the Lua plugin and Lr API library?

db

[DawMatt]

I've been chatting to Jon about this plugin recently, so will try to answer some of this.

DFBurns wrote:

I have the latest Lua plugin installed and just downlaoded the Lightroom API library. Can you straighten one thing out? You called it a Lightroom API plugin but it seems more like, from IntelliJ's point of view, that I should add it to my project as an external library. True?

Correct. See the wiki for installation details. BTW the wiki had a few issues and has only just been fixed so you probably couldn't access this at the time you posted this.

DFBurns wrote:

I have some other questions about getting things working right. In general, where is the best place to discuss issues for the Lua plugin and Lr API library?

The wiki includes some contact details for Jon. It also includes some information on how to build and install custom APIs, libraries and documentation which you might find useful.

It turns out the SDK plugin is currently limited to LR 3's SDK, and has some issues that mean the function name auto-completion should work but the LR SDK documentation probably won't. Hopefully this will be resolved before too long. I'm trying to give Jon a hand with it so we'll see what happens.

Matt

[DFBurns]

Thanks, Matt.

My project is all set up. Since you mention contacting Jon directly, is it safe to assume there's no forum where multiple people could get involved in questions (e.g. you)? For instance, where's the best place to ask why import statements are not resolving? If I have the line "local LrBinding = import 'LrBinding'", the import keyword is highlighted with the message "Unassigned variable usage". Somewhat similar, if I say "require 'X'" followed by "X.myfunc()", the X in X.myfunc is highlighted with the same message.

Thanks,

db

[DawMatt]

DFBurns wrote:

My project is all set up. Since you mention contacting Jon directly, is it safe to assume there's no forum where multiple people could get involved in questions (e.g. you)? For instance, where's the best place to ask why import statements are not resolving? If I have the line "local LrBinding = import 'LrBinding'", the import keyword is highlighted with the message "Unassigned variable usage". Somewhat similar, if I say "require 'X'" followed by "X.myfunc()", the X in X.myfunc is highlighted with the same message.

Thanks,

db

We are working on some issues with the plugin.

There aren't any forums for the plugin. I'll see about getting a public issues tracker setup.

Some known issues currently being looked into:

- import function is not currently supported, nor other Lightroom specific keywords, globals and functions mentioned in the SDK guide.

- the stdlibrary restrictions Ligthroom places on plugins aren't currently reflected in the SDK plugin (e.g. all the debug methods are listed as valid even though Lightroom doesn't allow some of rhtem)

- the SDK is currently LR3 only. LR4 will be added once we resolve some of the other issues.

- doco is not currently able to be displayed for objects. e.g. f:checkbox() won't show the LrView:checkbox() doco yet.

Some tips:

- the require issue you've noted can be worked around by right clicking on your source file folder and selecting the "mark directory as -> source root" option. But require scoping isn't honoured at the moment so the warnings for required files might not reflect their true scoping

- the documentation (e.g. ctrl + q) isn't working unless you tweak the plugin source to match your environment. e.g. I had to change a line in lr3api.lua to

    LOCAL_LUA_DOCS = []

  because that was where I installed my plugin. Please note that there is some issue with IntelliJ 12 support that means even this won't get the doco working on that version.

Hopefully that should help you get started. And I've added a wiki homepage to the project that links to documentation that will help people get started.

Matt

[DFBurns]

Matt -

Thanks for taking the time to give detailed info. Really helpful. Looking forward to improvements and let me know if you/Jon need help with testing.

db

[pedro224]

Hi,

is this thread still alive?

I'm about to start learning LUA for Lightroom plugin development and came across this forum after a Google search.

jsakhtar‌ / others,  is the Assembla site active? I'm considering jumping in, if so.

Regards to all,

Pedro

[johnrellis]

This forum (the SDK forum) has some of us still participating.  The Assembla site and its author, Rob Cole, are no longer active.

[jsakhtar]

The primary site is on bitbucket.

https://bitbucket.org/sylvanaar2/lua-for-idea/wiki/Home

I'd love a new contributor. These days its just too much work for me to

handle on my own.

[pedro224]

Thank you jsakhtar‌ and johnrellis‌

I'm also under heavy time-slicing, still I'd like to jump in, time permits.

My goals on Lua are related to Lightroom plugins (helpers in catalog organization / export) and also to run embedded, in micro-controllers.

This topic is on my radar and I'm willing to grasp it, so let's see how things evolve.

Regards

Pedro

[Guest]

Dear Jon, dear others contributors,

I just installed Idea (community V14) as well as the plug-in that I just discovered.

I do have some questions, as it seems that Idea's Interface quite changed between Version 12 and Version 14, and therefore the screenshots in the Wiki are quite difficult to follow.

Especially, on the wiki, there is a screenshot in which we have to select the home Directory of the Lua SDK. This looks completely different in Version 14 (with the plug-in installed): When I start a new project, I must select at the beginning the type of Project (Lua/Griffon/Maven/...). Then when I click on Lua and pick next, I can't choose a home Directory for the SDK, and I get proposed as SDK Kahlua and LuaJ, but not the normal Lua, and I haven't found a way to add a new SDK (see below screenshots)

Consequently, I don't know if (and how) the right Lua SDK is installed, and how to install the custom API for Lightroom.

Can you please help?

Thank you!

Regards from cold Germany