Sapphire 0.7 : Improved Date Support

As the Sapphire 0.7 release nears, I will be making a series of posts to highlight some of the exciting new features of this release. This is the first post in the series.

Date value properties are easier to define and the user experience is significantly improved. The formats specified by the developer using the new @Serialization annotation are visible as text overlay, in the property editor assistance popup and in the context help.

@Type( base = Date.class )
@Serialization( primary = "yyyy-MM-dd", alternative = "MM/dd/yyyy" )

ValueProperty PROP_ORDER_DATE = new ValueProperty( TYPE, "OrderDate" );

Value<Date> getOrderDate();
void setOrderDate( String value );
void setOrderDate( Date value );

The browse button opens a calendar, making it easy to quickly select the correct date.