Hi Aaron,
Looks great and sounds like something that might help my project. So
this tool then starts with a basic database definition and builds
Laszlo code? If it at least builds the framework and makes it look
nice, I can hire someone to update the Laszlo to tidy up, add
appropriate Ajax calls for data queries and interface to the
controller and model layers.
Do tell more...
I'll check out the dev site as well. Any screen shots of example apps?
Andrew
On Jul 10, 2007, at 10:17 PM, Aaron Judd wrote:
Andrew,
Please stop by and check out what we are building at http://
www.webapplica.org/clearspacex/community/arcticfusion. The
Arcticfusion (open source webtop) project's main goal is to build
a tool that provides the entire framework for building laszlo
applications. We don't provide any sort of GUI IDE, but we have a
generator tool that can reverse engineer and build that basic
laszlo screens if you have an existing database structure. If you
don't have a database structure, it can be defined in an xml file,
which will create both the laszlo interfaces, the database
structure, with crud functionality. We also have use the MULE ESB
at the core, so we connect to pretty much any existing application,
and build interfaces from their existing architectures. A simple
order entry application could be written in days, if not hours
complete with screens, help, and field validation (um, ok that
might be developer overestimation, but you get it).
Check the demo out to see 730 use case screens that were generated
in a few hours. Most of this can be generated quite quickly,here
is an example that was reversed from an existing database table.
The following example (partial) XML would generate create a table,
"product_order_item", create primary,composite key joined to other
tables, create a laszlo view, with search, and add new button,
input with the label "Order Item", and context help "Find and
select a order item".
<bean
xmlns="http://webapplica.org/tools";
xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance";
xsi:schemaLocation=" http://webapplica.org/tools http://
webapplica.org/tools/generation-1.0.xsd"
name="ProductOrderItem"
batchSize="5"
comment="Product Order Item Entity"
title="Product Order Item">
<table name="product_order_item" />
<cache usage="NONSTRICT_READ_WRITE" />
<meta
module="order"
author="WebApplica"
email="[EMAIL PROTECTED]"
version="1" />
<attributes>
<attribute
name="id"
comment="Composite ID">
<compositeKey comment="Composite ID">
<attributes>
<attribute
name="orderItem"
type="OrderItem"
comment="OrderItem">
<manyToOne>
<cache
usage="NONSTRICT_READ_WRITE" />
<joinColumns>
<joinColumn
name="order_id" />
<joinColumn
name="order_item_seq_id" />
</joinColumns>
</manyToOne>
<view label="Order Item">
<field
message="Find and
select a Order Item!"
dataLabel="productName" />
<grid
datapath="orderItem/product/@productName" />
</view>
</attribute>
We are actually building some initial demo modules based on the
Opentaps.org / OfBiz.org ERP, which includes a sales order entry
interface.
The project is quite early on (well, a year +), but we expect to
have a developer release of the framework out in the very near
future (30 days or so). We would be happy to spend some time
walking you through how the project could be used for building an
application like yours, and potentially we might be interested
building your example as one of the project examples. (Suggest
starting a proposal conversation on our dev site).
-Aaron
http://www.webapplica.org
Arcticfusion Project
On Jul 10, 2007, at 8:58 AM, Andrew McLaughlin wrote:
Hi all,
I'm just starting out on a pretty ambitious project to develop a
sales order entry Laszlo app (interfacing to MySQL via JSP).
Laszlo will be used strictly in an Ajax mode in that all data will
be loaded on the fly from the service, displaying a pop up list of
parts as they enter items or descriptions, showing the unit and
extended price as they enter values and even checking stock and
showing if a line item will be backordered once committed.
So far, I'm totally confident in what it will take to build the
middle and back tiers, however I'm a little concerned regarding
Laszlo. Heretofore, I would have built this using straight Struts,
but wanted to give the client a little more bang for the buck.
Question is: Is there any sort of GUI dev tool to layout the
Laszlo widgets or is it all hand XML coding? Is there at least a
XSD or even a DTD that I can leverage to speed up the effort?
Currently, I'm on the hook for the RFQ and basic design flow
including demonstrating how the UI will look (which will help sell
the entire project).
Are there any reference implementations of any sort of order entry
that I can look at to get an idea of best practices for laying the
application out?
Additionally, if you are a Laszlo consultant, I'd be interested in
farming out the GUI development to speed up the project as well.
Please reply in person and advise your billing rate and include a
link or two to some sample Laszlo apps that you may have built or
contributed to.
Thanks,
Andrew
