Creating Rainbox Plug-ins

You can extend Rainbox by creating your own shapes, color schemes, and clears. If you create something really cool, send it to me and I'll include it in Rainbox!

The JavaDoc is here. Here's a sample shape, clear, and color scheme.

FYI the API uses abstract classes instead of interfaces so that I can add methods in the future without breaking existing extensions. Also – if you want your plugin to run in IE's Java, you can only use Java 1.1. (No Swing and no Collections!)

To run your plugin in Rainbox, download the Rainbox JAR and save it somewhere. Then run Rainbox using a command like this:

java -cp rainbox.jar;c:\MyRainboxPluginDirectory
      -Drainbox.clears=MyClear,MyClear2 
      -Drainbox.shapes=com.me.SomeShape 
      -Drainbox.schemes=MyScheme 
      net.alexrosen.rainbox.Rainbox

Or, if you're on Windows and want to test it with the Microsoft VM, to ensure that your plugin will work with IE, do this:

jview /vst 
      /cp rainbox.jar;c:\MyRainboxPluginDirectory 
      -D:rainbox.clears=MyClear,MyClear2 
      -D:rainbox.shapes=com.me.SomeShape 
      -D:rainbox.schemes=MyScheme 
      net.alexrosen.rainbox.Rainbox