Since Creative Cloud 2014 launched on June 18, extension developers have been eager to migrate their extensions and panels to the new generation of Adobe apps. At this point in time, Extension Builder 2.1 does not support Creative Cloud 2014 when building Flash based extensions, and Extension Builder 3 preview 3 does not support Creative Cloud 2014 when building HTML5 extensions.
New developer tools will be released in the future. Meanwhile, it is easy to modify the current tools so that you can continue to use them to create extensions and panels for the new CC 2014 apps.
Let’s start with Extension Builder 3. The following tweaks will make it support the latest and greatest Creative Cloud apps.
Extension Builder 3
Step 1:
Open the menu Eclipse->Preferences and continue to select menu item Adobe Extension Builder 3->CC Launching Paths->Target Applications.
Modify the paths to the target applications. (Note: The paths listed below are for Mac OS. On Windows, applications are most often installed under the “Program Files” directory. Use the path to the executable file for the target application (e.g. Adobe Photoshop CC 2014.exe)
Illustrator: /Applications/Adobe Illustrator CC 2014/Adobe Illustrator CC 2014.app/Contents/MacOS/Adobe Illustrator
Photoshop: /Applications/Adobe Photoshop CC 2014/Adobe Photoshop CC 2014.app/Contents/MacOS/Adobe Photoshop CC 2014
Premiere Pro: /Applications/Adobe Premiere Pro CC 2014/Adobe Premiere Pro CC 2014.app/Contents/MacOS/Adobe Premiere Pro CC 2014
Prelude: /Applications/Adobe Prelude CC 2014/Adobe Prelude CC 2014.app/Contents/MacOS/Adobe Prelude CC 2014
InDesign: /Applications/Adobe InDesign CC 2014/Adobe InDesign CC 2014.app/Contents/MacOS/Adobe InDesign CC 2014
Flash: /Applications/Adobe Flash CC 2014/Adobe Flash CC 2014.app/Contents/MacOS/Adobe Flash CC 2014
The screenshot below shows the new settings on Mac.
Step 2
Eclipse->Preferences and continue to select menu item Adobe Extension Builder 3->CC Launching Paths->Service Manager
Change Service Manager Root Folder to:
Mac: /Library/Application Support/Adobe/CEP
Change User-specific Service Manager Root Folder to:
Mac: /Users/hallgrimur/Library/Application Support/Adobe/CEP
Click OK.
Step 3
Right click on your extension project (this assumes you have already created one) and select: Adobe Extension Builder 3->Bundle Manifest Editor
Navigate to the manifest.xml tab. Right click anywhere in it and choose Open With->XML Editor
Modify the Host parameters by updating the version to Creative Cloud.
For the CC 2014 products, these would be the parameters:
Illustrator:
<Host Name=”ILST” Version=”[18.0,18.9]” />
Photoshop:
<Host Name=”PHXS” Version=”[15.0,15.9]” />
<Host Name=”PHSP” Version=”[15.0,15.9]” />
Flash Pro:
<Host Name=”FLPR” Version=”[14.0,14.9]” />
Prelude:
<Host Name=”PRLD” Version=”[3.0,3.9]” />
InDesign
<Host Name=”IDSN” Version=”[10.0,10.9]” />
Premiere Pro
<Host Name=”PPRO” Version=”[8.0,8.9]” />
Finally, change the RequireRunTime attribute to :
<RequiredRuntime Name=”CSXS” Version=”5.0″ />
Step 4
Put your OS in extension debug mode:
- Win: regedit > HKEY_CURRENT_USER/Software/Adobe/CSXS.5
- Mac: /Users/<username>/Library/Preferences/com.adobe.CSXS.5.plist
Add a new entry PlayerDebugMode of type “string” with the value of “1”. This enables debug extensions to be displayed in the host applications.
Special notes for Mac 10.9 and higher
Staring with Mac 10.9, Apple introduced a caching mechanism for plist files. Your modifications to plist files does not take effect until the cache gets updated (on a periodic basis, you cannot know exactly when the update will happen). To make sure your modifications take effect, there are two methods.
- Kill cfprefsd process. It will restart automatically. Then the update takes effect.
- Restart your Mac, or log out the current user and re-log in.
Extension Builder 2.1
If you are building Flash based extensions for Creative Cloud 2014 apps, you must modify Extension Builder 2.1 in a similar way as outlined above.
Step 1
Flash Builder > Preferences > Adobe Extension Builder > CC launching Path
Service Manager
Change the Service Manager Root Folder to:
(OS X) /Library/Application Support/Adobe/CEP
(Win32) C:\Program Files\Common Files\Adobe\CEP
(Win64) C:\Program Files (x86)\Common Files\Adobe\CEP
Change the User Specific Service Manager Root Folder to:
(OS X) ~/LibraryApplication Support/Adobe/CEP
(Win) %APPDATA%\Adobe\CEP
Step 2
Flash Builder > Preferences > Adobe Extension Builder > Target Applications
Follow step 2 and step 3 in the instruction for Extension Builder 3.
You should now be able to use Extension Builder 2.1 for Creative Cloud 2014 products.
Comments
Thanks a lot. This is the kind of support we were waiting for.
Is there a way to change the manifest permanently in the template ?
Thanks !
Because we changed the target application to Photoshop CC 2014, will new extensions have the correct code in the manifest, or will that have to be changed every time we create a new extension ? If not, is there a way to make the extension builder template use the new settings as default when creating new extensions via the default extension template ?
Secondly, where does the manifest.xml file reside ? I’m using eclipse, but lets say I want to do edits to it with text wrangler or dreamweaver, can I access the manifest.xml in the mac finder and edit it in a different program….
Hi,
I did some digging around in the source code, and to change the manifest templates would need a recompilation of the Extension Builder Eclipse plugin.
Matt – I recommend just editing your extension in its installation folder using whatever code editor you like (not Eclipse). There are a lot of benefits to this. For example, you don’t have to restart Photoshop every time you tweak the panel. No need to “deploy”. Just hit save and close the panel and re-open it.
Also, the manifest is in that location.
You will develop much faster using this method.
Hello, in 2011 I previously developed an extension for Photoshop with Extension Builder 1.0 and the Actionscript-based CS SDK. The extension used LiveCycle Data Services to synchronize metadata in real time between an open image in Photoshop and an external metadata editor run from a Flex-based web page. Since at the time, there was no CS SDK support for Lightroom, I developed a custom solution that would watch a target directory for new images written there by a ‘tethered’ camera and Lightroom’s auto-import feature.
Ultimately, I’d like to know if Lightroom supports the new CS SDK since it is part of Creative Cloud. I’m aware that Lightroom does have it’s own SDK for LUA programmers, but I’d love to be able to develop LR extensions in HTML5/JavaScript instead.
Any news on LR support?
Thank you.
Hi,
There are no news on LR support – I would really want CEP to support LR too. I’ll pass your wish over to the LR team. Thanks!