The NetBeans Runtime Inspector facility lets you look at the structure of objects live in the IDE, provided they can be represented as JavaBeans (which many API-related objects can). To use the inspector, Flip to the Runtime tab in the Explorer and look under the NetBeans Runtime node - you will see some important folders in the system filesystem. You will also see the lookup helper.
In the inspector, by default nodes just show up as themselves, but they will show extra children. First of all, their regular children are displayed in a special subnode, to separate them from other things. Other subnodes may be displayed, including:
BeanInfo
is simply ignored, and all getter methods are treated as fair game--even if they
are not public methods. Useful for classes which have BeanInfo
which
does not include all the information you might to debug with.
InstanceCookie
will show that instance as a Bean.
Node
properties will appear as themselves, after an introduction.
Container
properties (i.e. visual beans) will show the AWT
component hierarchy.
FileSystem
properties additionally display the root folder.
This lets you browse to a specific file in the filesystem.
FileObject
properties additionally display the data object
(from which you can also see the node delegate). And you get a list of file
attributes by name.
File objects which are part of a MultiFileSystem
will show the
original filesystem which produced them. In the case of file objects in the
system filesystem, you can see the provenance of the file, indicating
whether it was defined in a module (including the core - generally some XML
layer); the user directory (global setting); the installation directory (rarer);
or the current project.
Clipboard
objects show the objects associated
with each currently supported data flavor in their
transferables. Go to java.awt.Clipboard
under Lookup results for
example. Also ExClipboard
objects will update this
information when it changes, and MultiTransferObject
objects are broken apart into constituent flavors.
Lookup.Provider
method (such as nodes, data objects, and so on)
will be examined for a list of all standard cookie types, and these cookies will be shown
in a separate sublist for examination.
(Details...)
It is possible to recognize your own cookie types, too;
if your module defines a cookie you wish to see listed, simply add an XML file to its layer
underneath Services/Hidden/ matching the DTD at
http://www.netbeans.org/dtds/apisupport-cookie-class-list-1_0.dtd.
FilterNode
s, you can see
the original node.