On Monday, April 29, 2002, at 06:06 PM, Dave Watts wrote:
>> BBBTW WebObjects, the first App Server on the web, was
>> originally developed by Next
>
> Be careful with this revisionist history! I'm not sure what it means to
> be
> an "app server", and WebObjects has been around for a long, long time,
> but
> there were CGI applications before then, I think.
>
I don't think I would consider a CGI application to be analogous to a
web App server... You could explain the difference much better than I,
but here's a couple of good references:
http://serverwatch.internet.com/articles/webapp/webapp_2.html
http://serverwatch.internet.com/appservers.html
I was surprised to learn that webobjects was the first web app server,
but here are some interesting references (a little dated like everything
else on the web):
Tidbits
http://serverwatch.internet.com/reviews/app-webobjects.html
(go up in the path to see reviews of other systems)
ServerWatch
http://serverwatch.internet.com/reviews/app-webobjects.html
Owendo - An interesting comparison of the majors including CF
http://a784.g.akamai.net/7/784/51/d6f991d0a5bcde/www.apple.com/webobjects/
pdf/owendo_report.pdf
Apple
http://www.apple.com/webobjects/
Here's an interesting quote:
WebObjects is no longer alone in the application server marketplace.
There are now numerous players, and they differ primarily in how they
separate the three fundamentals [user interface, program logic, data
access] above. It's instructional to study the different models: you can
see a clear evolution of design. What I find most impressive is that all
these models are slowly moving towards a common design: the design of
WebObjects.
That last sentence is loaded!
For my own edification, I downloaded the OSX Developer version (free
Evaluation) including OpenBase RDBMS.
Honestly, it is not as easy to learn as CF (No Bible by Forta, et al).
But it is a more complex [rich] solution (object oriented), involving
separation of presentation (HTML with WebObject Tags*), programming
logic (Java or whatever) and database abstraction into enterprise (Java)
objects**.
* The webobject tags are references to external Java object
properties and methods... if you will, calls to the
program logic rather than the program logic itself.
** Database rows are treated as instances of Java-like objects...
the application programmer is normally
shielded from SQL, caching, transaction
commitment/backout, locking, stored procedures, mfgr specific
db implementation, etc. A GUI tool and/or wizard is used
to map a database to these enterprise objects.
The Enterprise Objects are external to the program logic and
are shared by all programs... they need be
changed only when the db schema or implementation changes
and need not require changes to program
or presentation.
There is a thorough tutorial, although prematurely technical (IMO).
Within a few minutes, I was able to use a wizard to generate a set of db
maintenance programs for a web app (ala DBBlocks.
Shortly thereafter, I was able to write simple Java web apps including
db update, etc..
The IDE is similar to Tango by Pervasive... but much richer and more
intuitive.
The IDE also supports other languages/logistics from OSA scripting, Java
Client, Java standalone (Swing GUI); as well as OS X Native apps in
several languages with aqua GUI.
I would like to see CFMX, FlashMX and JRun supported in this
environment... IMO they would quickly become the web development tools
of choice for Mac web developers... and just maybe some non-Mac
developers too.
Some subtleties are:
There is an omnipresent, Web Server, App server(s), complete Java
environment, mail server, database
server, yadda, yadda, yadda... you could easily develop many
flavors of CF Apps, Standalone, Thin client,
rich client, staged client...
HTH
Dick
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