OSGi SAT, how should we deal with activation failure?

Question

The eclipse OSGi Service Activator Toolkit provides a framework that simplifies handling the dependencies between budles.

One can derive from org.eclipse.soda.sat.core.framework.BaseBundleActivator and over-ride (for example) the activate() method to do some spefic initialisation work.

The signature is protected void activate(){}

Which leads to the question: "what are we spposed to do if activate() fails?", suppose for some reason we cannot initialise correctly. I can't throw an exception, the method signatiure won't allow that.

Answer 1

It's still possible to throw RuntimeException and Error (And Exceptions that inherit these). (Remember that Error indicates serious problems that a reasonable application should not try to catch.)

It would also seems like a good idea to output something to your logging facility.

The alternative you choose is dependent on the situation; what the root cause of the failed activation is. If the cause is something abnormal, that should not happen during normal circumstances, an Error or RuntimeException (and ofcourse loggin) feels right.

Answer 2

Throwing an RuntimeException or an Error in the activate() method does not help you if you are using Equinox (tested with org.eclipse.osgi_3.5.1.R35x_v20090827). Independent of what you are throwing the bundle will finally end up in state ACTIVE.

I assume that this behavior is specific to Equinox (bug?) because from my understanding this violates the OSGi specs.