Using a Plug-In

Once a plug-in has been created and added to the system by publishing it to the Library, it is available for components to use.

Each plug-in type is unique, and the component that uses it must know what functions are available from each type of plug-in, typically by forcing it to adhere to some interface. For example, while the Java class for a DOE Technique plug-in extends the base plug-in class, it also implements a specific DOE Technique interface that the DOE component knows about to ensure that it provides the expected functionality. However, the primary means of accessing and dealing with plug-ins from within component code can be described in general.

To query the plug-ins of a specified type that are available, the following call can be made:

pluginMetaModels =
MetaModelManager.instance().browseMetaModelsByPluginTypeName(type);

The items in this list are MetaModel objects that contain information about the plug-in, including the name, description, etc. For a given MetaModel (i.e., plug-in), you can access the runtime class that typically contains the functionality for the plug-in by

MyPluginIfc pluginInst = (
MyPluginIfc)pluginMM.getRuntimeClass(com.engineous.sdk.runtime.Plugin.
class).newInstance();

As mentioned above, the Java class for the plug-in implements a specific interface, in this case MyPluginIfc; therefore, the component can be sure that the required methods can be called. At this point, the component now has access to the necessary functionality. For example, the DOE component accesses a DOE Technique plug-in using the calls listed above and then calls, among many other functions,

doeTechPluginInst.generateDesignMatrix()

which is specific to DOE Techniques. Use this same mechanism for your plug-ins so that components that want/need to use those plug-ins know what methods they can call.

For convenience, a component editor can make use of two GUI widgets provided in the Isight SDK to interact with a list of available plug-ins:

com.engineous.sdk.gui.PluginChooserCombo
com.engineous.sdk.gui.PluginChooserList

Refer to the javadocs in your Isight installation for specific details regarding use of these widgets.

When a specific plug-in instance is created and configured, it can be stored with the component in the Isight model by calling:

component.addPlugin(pluginInst)

You can remove a plug-in from a component by calling

component.removePlugin(type)

To get a plug-in that is being used by the component, call the output constraints directly: 

DtPlugin plugin = component.getPlugin(type);
MetaModel pluginMM = plugin.getMetaModel();
// Create an instance of the runtime class (the specific interface)
MyPluginIfc pluginInst = 
(MyPluginIfc)pluginMM.getRuntimeClass(com.engineous.sdk.runtime.Plugin
.class).newInstance();

Other algorithms work only with the objective and penalty function values.