I'll throw in my 2 cents here too, since this is a question I've asked myself many times.
The strength of MapBuilder is the MVC design pattern for building applications, and handling the model on the client side. (Most MVC frameworks hold the model on the server side) This means that MapBuilder is extremely extensible, in that it can be programmed to handle any document type quite easily. In fact there is nothing inherently 'geo' about MB, it just so happened that the early developers wanted to make mapping applications and the web services to support those were relatively well advanced. The same framework can be used for any web services. Personally, I think our heavy use of XML and XSL is a benefit as well because XSL and XPath is the preferred way of processing XML documents. The X in AJAX stands for XML after all... At it's core, OpenLayers is really an API or core library for rendering, drawing and event handling for maps in a 2-d window on the browser. It is very good at that because that is what it was designed to do, as evidenced by it's uptake in a number of client application frameworks. I would be careful about expanding the scope of OL beyond what it has now e.g. supporting a Context doc is probably is scope because it has to do with map initialization, but on the other hand it has already been implemented by other frameworks. Mike Cameron Shorter wrote: > In addition to Andrea's comments. > In Mapbuilder, we can use XSL while in Openlayers all XML parsing is > done by JS converting XML into JS objects. > > For building a widget like a Legend from an XML service (like GML), XSL > is still the easier technology to work with. > > There are moves to support JSON as a transport language which will make > things much easier for Openlayers, but I think this will be a couple of > years before all components are in place. > > In the long term, I hope that Openlayers and Mapbuilder will grow closer > and effectively merge. The integration with Rendering being the first step. > > Andreas Hocevar wrote: > >> Hi Bart, >> >> On Nov 21, 2007 10:31 AM, Bart van den Eijnden (OSGIS) <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> >> wrote: >> >> >>> I agree with 2 (I come from a server-side framework, i.e. Chameleon), but >>> ofcourse since OL already provides most of the building blocks (GML parser >>> etc.) it will require a few lines of code to interact with the OGC Web >>> Services. >>> >>> >> Yes, and in MB 2.0 we will most certainly drop a lot of our own code >> in favor of the code that is alreay in OL. The MB advantage here is: >> once you have a XML from a web service in your app, you can use it in >> a map, a list, a table, a form... OL only covers the map and maybe >> some map-related controls (like LayerSwitcher), and MB just needs a >> simple XSL stylesheet to convert it into widget content. >> >> >> >>> Wrt 1, since OL is providing more and more controls (in the library itself >>> or in the addons), the "application around the map" will become thinner and >>> thinner or not? >>> >>> >> >> >>> Wrt 3, IMHO you can also build reusable widgets in OL itself or in a >>> framework like MapFish around OL. >>> >>> >> I would see MapFish as a competitor to Mapbuilder. But OL is a library >> meant to build applications around it. >> >> IMO, Mapbuilder and MapFish (and Fusion, and Mapbender and all the >> others) are application building toolkits, whereas OpenLayers is a >> library (and a damn good one). >> >> And finally, all the application building toolkits around have a >> different concept, with Mapbuilder being the only one known to me >> without a server side. >> >> Regards, >> Andreas. >> >> ------------------------------------------------------------------------- >> This SF.net email is sponsored by: Microsoft >> Defy all challenges. Microsoft(R) Visual Studio 2005. >> http://clk.atdmt.com/MRT/go/vse0120000070mrt/direct/01/ >> _______________________________________________ >> mapbuilder-devel mailing list >> [email protected] >> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/mapbuilder-devel >> >> >> > > > ------------------------------------------------------------------------- This SF.net email is sponsored by: Microsoft Defy all challenges. Microsoft(R) Visual Studio 2005. http://clk.atdmt.com/MRT/go/vse0120000070mrt/direct/01/ _______________________________________________ mapbuilder-devel mailing list [email protected] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/mapbuilder-devel
