Opened up multiple final and package private classes and methods in Nodes and Propertysheet APIs

[makusuko]

Opened up multiple final and package private classes and methods to support more flexible subclassing and modifications in the Nodes and Propertysheet APIs.

See https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/NETBEANS-4222.

[matthiasblaesing]

As Geertjan said in Jira, this should be discussed first. Opened API can become a burden and this means without concrete usecases, that can't be realized with the current API this won't fly. It is also a long time commitment, so will you be around to fix issues in 2-3 years?

[JaroslavTulach]

I tried to summarize the rationale for not making everything public in my Practical API Design book. There is even a story where a colleague of mine wanted to make Node.getChildren() method overridable in subclasses and why it is still final. In short: there has to be a balance between freedom of API users and freedom of API maintainers. Btw. there is a freedom chapter in the 20 API Paradoxes e-book.

Chapter 16 of the Practical API Design book contains a section "Accepting API Patches". Reading it I can say that your proposal removes our freedom because:

• Your patch restricts future evolution
• You have provided completely underdocumented patch
  • the classes/methods you make public aren't documented
  • but worse: the overall use-case isn't explained
• You want to make API changes without any test coverage
• Your API changes aren't versioned

I am not convinced it is enough justified to give up the NetBeans API evolution freedom by accepting your changes at current state.

[JaroslavTulach]

I guess I scared the reporter enough... Sorry for that, I hope you will not give up on NetBeans, Markus.