Matt, This looks like it will be an interesting presentation. For me, Wicket is the main reason I decided I'm happy to do a bit of Web development. You can build applications that give you the satisfaction of being well designed and engineered, especially if you believe that OO is good. A big plus for many people is the total lack of xml (apart from the obligatory web.xml, of course). You get all the benefits of an OO, strongly typed language and the fantastic power of the IDEs available today when you use java to define how your application behaves. Wicket let's you design and build good web applications the way you want to. In essence, you are building just another plain old java application (POJA ?) and you can use all the tools and techniques that you already know make sense for the class of software you are building. The integration with mainstream middle-tier frameworks like Spring, Guice, Hibernate, Acegi etc make it a breeze to develop using what you have already decided makes good system development a better experience. Everything I have tried just works. I would never have thought that adding Ajax to a web app could be made to be so easy. And, on top of that, there are excellent contributions that allow very easy and robust integration with the likes of Google Maps, Prototype, Dojo and other useful client-side libraries. Custom components are an essential fact of life in real world systems. I cannot imagine how Wicket could be bettered on this front. The total separation of the view (html, css) from the display logic/mode makes perfect sense to me too. If you fancy yourself as an html/css artist, go ahead and make a good-looking/feeling app. If not, give the html/css work to someone who knows what to do with html/css and they won't need to learn anything else. Everyone I know that has used Wicket seems to think it's incredibly clever, useful and a joy to work with. I must admit that I am a big believer in the benefits of OO, so the Wicket development effort seemed much more natural to me than the few other frameworks that I spent a very limited time with. I have no doubt that some of these other frameworks have very good features, but having started using Wicket, everything else seems like a step in the wrong direction or at the very least, a lot harder to do what you feel is right with. On the other hand, I don't feel I have quite enough experience with them to make any strong statements. I am lucky to work with Java 5. This goes well with Wicket, even though it is still 1.4 compliant. I am looking forward to the next version, ported to 1.5, with genericised Wicket Models adding to the quality of the development experience. The documentation is not the best, but it seems to be improving all the time and I know for a fact that this will get more attention soon. There are already excellent examples to help you get going and that cover/illustrate pretty much all of Wicket's features. Finally, don't under-estimate the value of this mailing-list. It is full of very bright and helpful people who will assist with any problem you post about. And, you will usually get this help, and sometimes an interesting, thought provoking and instructional discussion brewing, within minutes. I hope your presentation goes well.
Regards - Cemal http://jWeekend.co.uk http://jWeekend.co.uk mraible wrote: > > I didn't say my cons were valid - but I do believe there *are* cons to > Wicket. What are they - in your opinion? > > matt > > > igor.vaynberg wrote: >> >>> * HTML templates live next to Java code >> this is easily changed - just a default >> >>> * Need to have a good grasp of OO >> why is this a con? you are saying not knowing oo is a good thing? you >> can say this is a pro - learning wicket will make you a better >> developer :) >> >>> * The Wicket Way - everything done in Java >> as opposed to embedding logic in views which has been something >> plaguing other frameworks for ages? >> >> -igor >> >> --------------------------------------------------------------------- >> To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] >> For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] >> >> >> > > -- View this message in context: http://www.nabble.com/Matt-Raible%27s-ApacheCon-presentation-tf4815955.html#a13781901 Sent from the Wicket - User mailing list archive at Nabble.com. --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
