TIBCO ActiveMatrix BusinessWorks™ Plug-in Development Kit is a tool that speeds up the development of new plug-ins for TIBCO ActiveMatrix BusinessWorks™.&nbsp;

BusinessWork Plug-in Development Kit provides a wizard-driven approach to creating palettes and activities, configuring each activity input/output, and generating the scripts for a new plug-in.&nbsp;

Why PDK? What does it take? How to use it?

BusinessWorks PDK works with TIBCO Business Studio (BWCE/BW6) and is used to create plug-ins that are not yet presently available Out-of-the-box from the platform that boost developers' productivity. So developers are free to build their custom activities that will solve the business challenges that they're facing. Once developed, the plug-ins are installed and utilized exactly the same way as the plug-in provided by TIBCO.  

BusinessWorks PDK camouflages the intricacy of the plug-in development process, generates the compliant code to BusinessWorks SDK specifications, and delivers tooling to package, install, and document the plug-in.

The subsequent figure describes a complete workflow of creation to usage of a custom plug-in using the BusinessWorks Plug-in Development Kit.

You can use and refer below ready to use palette project that we're going to build during this journey. The steps of how you can use the already build project are available in readme.md file :)&nbsp;

Introduction

In this section, we'll discuss how you can create a new custom plugin using Plugin Development Kit in the TIBCO BusinessWorks.&nbsp;

The plugin development process is divided into 2 part:

Let's discuss and understand each of the part in plugin lifecycle steps-by-step.

For this example, we will be creating a new palette named&nbsp;WriteToLog&nbsp;having an activity called&nbsp;Log.&nbsp;This activity will take input from the user and print it over the console.

Here, we'll be designing the palette model, describing the input, output or fault and diferernt attributes.&nbsp; 

2. Open the BusinessWorks Plug-in Development Kit wizard from the menu, click&nbsp;File &gt;&nbsp;New &gt;&nbsp;Create a new or modify BW Plug-in Project.

Creating &amp; configuring the&nbsp; palette &amp; Activity&nbsp;

As a result of the process, soon as the code generation is completed, the design time, model, and runtime bundles and features are displayed in TIBCO Business Studio

After configuring the palette and activities, you need to define the behavior for the activity. By adding business logic to the activity code we'll be defining the behavior for our palette.&nbsp;

Importing Runtime &amp; Model projects&nbsp;

1. Now, in the Project Explorer view, expand the&nbsp;com.tibco.bw.palette.writetolog.runtime&nbsp;folder.

2.&nbsp; Click and open the&nbsp; src &gt; com.tibco.bw.palette.writetolog.runtime &gt; LogAsynchronousActivity.java file.

Now, your custom palette is ready and we can confirm the behavior by using activity in the application. Let's do that...

Creating a Custom Palette

In this section, we'll be using the palette that we can create and configure in the last section. This will give us the impression of our palette behavior.

Lets start with creating new BunsinessWorks application...

Configuring the BusinessWorks Application

You now can see that we have successfully created and tested the custom palette that we build. Now, we need to package the palette and distribute for use.&nbsp;

Testing the Plugin

In this section, we'll be discussing how you can quickly generate the installer for your plugin so you can install and distribute it for further use.

On the console, you will see the packaging logs as well as you will find the location where the installer package has been created. 

Usually, it is under your workspace as highlighted below,

Please refer to simple straight forward steps documented <a href="https://docs.tibco.com/pub/bwpdk/6.3.1/doc/html/Default.htm#developers-guide/installing-a-created-plug-in.htm">here</a> in the official TIBCO PDK document.&nbsp;

Packaging & Installing the plugin

As you've noticed, creating a custom palette or activity via TIBCO Plugin Development Kit is straightforward and provides a strong capability to build palettes/activities that are not available OOTB with the product. 

The plugin can be easily packaged for distribution and installed exactly the same way as other products.

How to Create custom plugin using Plug-in Development Kit in TIBCO BusinessWorks?

Milind Pandav