NetBeans Mobility Pack for CLDC/MIDP 5.5 Release Notes

Welcome to the NetBeans Mobility Pack for CLDC/MIDP 5.5, an add-on pack that provides the tools for creating Java Micro Edition (Java ME) applications that support the Connected, Limited Device Configuration (CLDC)/Mobile Information Device Profile (MIDP) technologies.

System Requirements

The NetBeans Mobility Pack 5.5 runs on the J2SE JDK 5.0 (Java 2 JDK, Standard Edition), which consists of the Java Runtime Environment plus developer tools for compiling, debugging, and running applications written in the Java language.

The NetBeans Mobility Pack 5.5 runs on operating systems that support the Java VM. Below is a list of platforms that the Mobility Pack has been tested on.

• Microsoft Windows 2000 Professional SP4
• Microsoft Windows XP Professional SP2
• Red Hat Fedora Core 3

The Mobility Pack includes the J2ME Wireless Toolkit, version 2.2.

Note: The platforms supported by the NetBeans Mobility Pack might differ from those supported by the emulator you plan to use. You should verify that both the Mobility Pack and the emulator you plan to use are supported on your particular platform.

Bugs and Issues

To file a new bug, request a new feature or feature enhancement, or check on the status of an existing bug, use the Issuezilla bugtracking system: http://www.netbeans.org/issues/enter_bug.cgi?component=mobility&version=5.5

Note: Projects created with the Visual Mobile Designer in earlier versions of the Mobility Pack will be upgraded to a new format when opened in version 5.5. Once saved, they can not be opened in earlier versions of the Mobility Pack. For specific details, see http://wiki.netbeans.org/wiki/view/MobilityVisualDesignerVersions.

The major unresolved issues for this release are as follows:

• The NetBeans Mobility Pack will not run if the name of, or path to, the installation directory or user directory
  contains non-ASCII characters.
  
• The J2ME Wireless Toolkit will not run if the name of, or path to, the Toolkit installation directory or user directory contains non-ASCII characters.
  
• The J2ME Wireless Toolkit 2.2 emulator does not support multibyte characters in a Mobility project name or in a Java class that will become the name of a MIDlet or MIDlet suite. You can develop such a project using the IDE, but you will not be able build or run the application if you are using the J2ME Wireless Toolkit 2.2 as your target platform.
  

  Workaround: Use ASCII characters only in the name of the project and program class names, or configure the project to use an emulator that supports multibyte characters.

• You cannot add external J2ME Wireless Toolkit emulators in the Linux distribution under certain permissions.
  
  When adding the platform using the Java Platform Manager (JPM), the tool's browser recognizes any J2ME Wireless Toolkit directories and marks them with the appropriate icon in the file dialog. If you attempt to add an external Wireless Toolkit on Linux installed under root or a different user account, however, the process fails even though the Wireless Toolkit installation appears valid. This is a known issue and is caused by wrong permissions set on the Wireless Toolkit executables. As a result the JPM cannot execute the emulator executable and get the detailed information it needs about the platform.

  Workaround: Install the external J2ME Wireless Toolkit under the same user account as the one you use to run the NetBeans IDE. Optionally, if you have root access you can change the permissions on the Wireless Toolkit directories and executables but that is not advisable as it can cause major problems for other users using that Wireless Toolkit installation.

• Visual Mobile Designer projects saved in Mobility Pack 5.0 or Mobility Pack 5.5 Beta 2 are not backwards-compatible with Mobility Pack 4.1 projects. Once you save a project in version 5.0 or the 5.5 Beta, it cannot be reopened in version 4.1.
  
• Issue #79039: Cannot Generate Mobile Client To Web Application for J2EE 5 Web service clients
  
  The Mobile Client to Web Application wizard doesn't work with Web services client created in J2EE 5 format. The wizard doesn't show these Web service clients in the combo box on the first panel.

Workaround: Create a new J2EE 1.4 Web project and add Web service client to your desired service. From the Mobility project just select web service client added to this new project.

• Run through OTA can be very slow.
  
• If you add multiple custom components to the MIDP Visual Designer Component Palette, the last custom component added occasionally becomes unusable.

Workaround: Remove the custom component and add it again using the Component Palette Manager.


• Emulator opens, but no MIDlet is shown when debugging a multi-threaded application, or when an application is being debugged on dual machines. This is due to a bug in the J2ME Wireless Toolkit 2.2.

  Workaround: Turn off hyperthreading while debugging.

• When you create a new Mobile Client to Web Application, a sample MIDlet can not be generated if the parameter of the Web service is a type that can not be easily represented in the Visual Mobile Developer, such as an array.

Documentation

Documentation is provided for the NetBeans Mobility Pack in the form of web-based guides and the IDE's help system. You can use the following documents to get started:

• NetBeans Mobility Pack 5.5 for CLDC/MIDP Features and Download Page
• NetBeans Mobility Pack 5.5 for CLDC/MIDP Quick Start Guide
• Importing Existing Java ME MIDP Source Code into NetBeans IDE 5.5