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Migration from IntelliJ Platform to Consulo ​

Java Module System (JPMS) ​

  • Consulo enforces strict Java module system (JPMS). This required two major changes:
    • All packages have been renamed — all JetBrains/IntelliJ packages (com.intellij.*, org.jetbrains.*) have been moved to consulo.* packages. You cannot simply copy IntelliJ plugin code — all imports must be updated.
    • Code has been split into separate modules — the monolithic IntelliJ platform codebase has been decomposed into many smaller, well-defined modules. Each module has a proper module-info.java with explicit exports and requires declarations.
    • Examples of package changes:
      • com.intellij.openapi.project.Project → consulo.project.Project
      • com.intellij.openapi.editor.Editor → consulo.codeEditor.Editor
      • com.intellij.psi.PsiElement → consulo.language.psi.PsiElement

Unified UI ​

  • Consulo replaces the Swing-only UI with a unified UI API that works across multiple backends:
    • Swing — primary desktop implementation
    • SWT — alternative desktop implementation (experimental)
    • Vaadin Flow — web implementation (experimental)
  • Plugins should use the consulo.ui.* API instead of Swing directly. This allows your plugin to work on all backends.
  • Key modules:
    • ui-api — core UI interfaces and components
    • ui-ex-api — extended UI components and utilities
  • See Unified UI Overview for more details.

Build System & Maven ​

  • Consulo uses Maven as its build system. All platform and plugin artifacts are published to the Consulo Maven repository.
    • Maven repository: maven.consulo.dev
    • IntelliJ's Gradle-based intellij-plugin build tooling is not supported.
  • See Build System and Maven Guide for details on setting up your plugin project.

Plugin Declaration changes ​

  • XML-based plugin declarations (plugin.xml) have been removed. Consulo uses annotation-based plugin declarations instead.
    • Extension points, extensions, actions, and other plugin components are now declared using Java annotations rather than XML configuration files.
    • See Plugin Configuration File for the current annotation-based approach.

Platform changes ​

  • Plugins removed from platform. They plugin ids:
    • Java > consulo.java (and removed his old id, com.intellij.modules.java )
    • Xml > com.intellij.xml
    • RegExp > com.intellij.regexp
    • Images > com.intellij.images
  • Added plugin named Platform: base have id com.intellij. It holder for all extensions/actions/extensionPoints for platform
  • Consulo uses its own versioning (e.g. 3-SNAPSHOT), not IntelliJ build numbers. See Platform Versioning.
  • Now some Consulo plugins ids is not working anymore
    • com.intellij.modules.lang > not need to write. It will throw 'plugin not found'
    • com.intellij.modules.platform > not need to write. It will throw 'plugin not found'
    • com.intellij.modules.vcs > not need to write. It will throw 'plugin not found'
    • com.intellij.modules.xdebugger > not need to write. It will throw 'plugin not found'
    • com.intellij.modules.ultimate > obsolete (we don't have Ultimate version)
    • com.intellij.modules.ruby > obsolete. Use consulo.ruby. See plugin repo
    • com.intellij.modules.python > obsolete. Use consulo.python. See plugin repo
    • com.intellij.modules.objc > obsolete (we don't have ObjC implementation)

API changes ​

  • Parsing API changes:
    • language version api.
      • ParserDefinition#createLexer(Project) -> ParserDefinition#createLexer(LanguageVersion)
      • ParserDefinition#createParser(Project) -> ParserDefinition#createParser(LanguageVersion)
      • ParserDefinition#getWhitespaceTokens() -> ParserDefinition#createParser(LanguageVersion)
      • ParserDefinition#getCommentTokens() -> ParserDefinition#getCommentTokens(LanguageVersion)
      • ParserDefinition#getStringLiteralElements() -> ParserDefinition#getStringLiteralElements(LanguageVersion)
  • Injections
    • com.intellij.lang.injection.MultiHostInjector changes:
      • getLanguagesToInject renamed to injectLanguages
      • elementsToInjectIn removed
      • Declaration changed from<multiHostInjector implementation="org.intellij.plugins.intelliLang.inject.xml.XmlLanguageInjector"/>to<multiHostInjector forClass="com.intellij.psi.xml.XmlAttributeValue" implementationClass="org.intellij.plugins.intelliLang.inject.xml.XmlLanguageInjector"/> Attribute forClass is value of elementsToInjectIn method
  • Module Facets & Module Types was replaced by Module Extensions
  • JPS support was dropped, that why external build is not supported for now
  • com.intellij.openapi.module.Module.getModuleFilePath dropped due, Consulo dont have module files, all info stored in .consulo dir. Use com.intellij.openapi.module.Module#getModuleDirPath for it
  • .impl & .ipr files are not supported anymore. Now all module info stored in .consulo dir