Embedding Guvnor just means that you hide the top-level interface, and embed
the guided editor into your web app. So if you're not fond of the guided
editor, then embedding doesn't solve the problem.
How far did you get into DSLs? When used within the guided editor, you get a
list of DSL phrases to choose from, and having picked one, users can just drop
values into the slots you make available in the templates, and you can provide
enums to populate drop-down lists. It's fairly close to what you're after.
Generally with Guvnor, you do need a team of users who are pretty open to the
rather over-technical guided editor UI that it offers, with all its
Java-influenced package structures. The competition such as FICO Blaze and
IBM/ILOG JRules do a better job here, *if* you're prepared to spend the money
and spend the time learning your way around their IDEs for designing templates.
If you're up for spending the time on it, you can build your own UI to generate
DRL, and use the Guvnor REST interface to upload the rules. That way, you can
potentially get whatever UI you like, but it's a lot of work.
Depending on your taste for adventure, another option would be to check out the
version 6 betas. The new workbench supposedly provides much more in the way of
customisation options. Check out Mark Proctor's presentation here, for some of
what it offers:
http://docs.jboss.org/drools/blog/LondonJBUG2013rulesmarkp/assets/fallback/index.html
Steve
On 11 Aug 2013, at 21:09, Mark Bennett <[email protected]> wrote:
> Thanks Steve.
>
> I'll check out dozer.
>
> I did look at DSL's, but the emphasis is really on putting a UI on things.
>
> Your advice on hold off baking in every single field also mirrors a point
> that was raised on the team recently. Advanced users can always drop into
> DRL mode, etc.
>
> Actually, Guvnor's guided rules isn't our ideal UI either. I think we were
> hoping for more of a "wizard" toolkit where users select from a list of
> pre-existing rules and fill in templates, at least as an option for new
> users. Then more advanced users could jump out to the guided rules or even
> the expert / DRL rules mode. But Guvnor's guided rules are still a pretty
> advanced UI for newcomers. It's kind of funny, I think people assume that
> anything that has a "UI" is easy/obvious to use, even for new users; I'm
> pretty sure we could all rattle off many counter-examples from the software
> world. ;-)
>
> Any thoughts on conjuring a simpler UI for truly "guided" rules creation? I
> read that Guvnor could be embedded, but not sure that really helps either.
>
> --
> Mark Bennett / LucidWorks: Search & Big Data / [email protected]
> Office: 408-898-4201 / Telecommute: 408-733-0387 / Cell: 408-829-6513
>
> On Aug 10, 2013, at 2:14 AM, Stephen Masters <[email protected]>
> wrote:
>
>> Your plan seems about right to me. When working in pure Drools, you don't
>> always need to do this. However, when working in Guvnor, I have always found
>> it necessary to create a simplified domain model for facts.
>>
>> In Guvnor, you can bind variables to fields and drill in, but it's fiddly.
>> Guided rules are much more readable when they are dealing with matching
>> bean-style facts with key attributes available through simple getX()
>> accessor methods. And of course you definitely need the bean-style getX()
>> methods.
>>
>> The other thing to think about, is that when working with Guvnor, you should
>> be avoiding any dependencies on external classes from within your facts.
>> Otherwise, you will need to put everything on your Guvnor web server's class
>> path, which totally messes with your ability to upload fact model updates.
>> Yet another reason to keep them simple.
>>
>>
>> So given that you're going with that plan, here are my tips for the lazy
>> (like me)...
>>
>> To help with simplifying your transformations, it may be worth looking at
>> Dozer or similar: http://dozer.sourceforge.net/
>>
>> Personally, because I have often found that I'm doing things like mapping
>> multiple objects into a single fact, I tend to just do the mapping in
>> straight Java code. It tends not to be too painful, as I rarely find the
>> need for bi-directional mappings. I don't often need to get a fact back out
>> of working memory. So although it feels a bit naughty, I often avoid the
>> fact-to-domain-object transform. :)
>>
>> Think about what properties you really might want to write rules about. It's
>> easy to spend a huge amount of time writing a huge fact model, and
>> transforms for every single property of every class in your domain model.
>> Truth is you probably won't write rules that look at all of it. So have a
>> think about whether you do need to map everything or not. My tip here would
>> be to follow a TDD approach. Look at what rules your users want to write.
>> You should find that the rules mostly follow certain stereotypes, so create
>> rule tests covering a representative selection of such stereotype (ensure
>> coverage of all unique fact attributes which are examined). Create a fact
>> model which can satisfy those tests. Create tests for transforming from your
>> domain model to your fact model. Create transforms to that fact model.
>> Assuming you have a reasonably iterative environment, you can add transforms
>> for additional attributes when users have tried out the application and come
>> up with new rule stereotypes they would like to work with.
>>
>>
>> As an alternative (or to complement the above), take a look at DSLs. Each
>> DSL phrase becomes available in your guided editor, so you can have simple
>> rule phrases which the users can understand, but underneath, you can have
>> code which is drilling into nested objects.
>>
>> I do hope that's helpful… :)
>>
>> Steve
>>
>>
>>
>> On 10 Aug 2013, at 00:47, Mark Bennett <[email protected]> wrote:
>>
>>> We want our domain experts to be able to create Guided Rules in Guvnor (5.5)
>>>
>>> But Guvnor seems pretty limited about what it will accept, and how it will
>>> render it.
>>>
>>> We're attempting to create adapter classes that will:
>>> * Allow us to expose a rich set of fields and methods in UI
>>> * Use as injected facts into the engine
>>>
>>> Main issues we're having:
>>> * Native objects are nested, but Guvnor seems to want shallow
>>> * Our native objects can have different attributes (different schemas)
>>> - And you can't say getField( fieldName )
>>> * Some returned items can be multivalued, vs. singular
>>>
>>> Our idea is:
>>> * Have admin send a prototypical request & schema event into our native
>>> system
>>> * Scrape and flatten that into a java class that exposes Guvnor friendly
>>> methods
>>> * Send that class into Guvnor
>>> * Keep a copy of that class to create instances of when injecting facts
>>> into the engine
>>>
>>> Is there some type of easy way to map complex objects to/from the simpler
>>> Guvnor/Drools model? Some type of reflection based mapper with some simple
>>> rules or a template? We're wondering what others have done in this
>>> situation?
>>>
>>> Thanks,
>>> Mark
>>>
>>> --
>>> Mark Bennett / LucidWorks: Search & Big Data / [email protected]
>>> Office: 408-898-4201 / Telecommute: 408-733-0387 / Cell: 408-829-6513
>>>
>>>
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> rules-users mailing list
>>> [email protected]
>>> https://lists.jboss.org/mailman/listinfo/rules-users
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> rules-users mailing list
>> [email protected]
>> https://lists.jboss.org/mailman/listinfo/rules-users
>
> _______________________________________________
> rules-users mailing list
> [email protected]
> https://lists.jboss.org/mailman/listinfo/rules-users
_______________________________________________
rules-users mailing list
[email protected]
https://lists.jboss.org/mailman/listinfo/rules-users
