From: Aaron Bartell
The important point is that it's standard JSF code and now the designer
can play with it and do whatever they want using the WYSIWYG editor. Best
of all, they can do it in a RAD session with the end user, using real data
from the real file.
You don't work with designers very much do you :-) First, try teaching a
creatively minded person how to use WDSC, and then try to convince them it
is better than their xyz tooling. With that said, business applications
(that aren't customer facing) DON'T need to look nice - or rather they can
use a slim and trim css to get'r'done.
And so what's your point here? That you have to use Dreamweaver to write
your screens? Or that you shouldn't have nice looking screens? Anyway, the
Rational JSF tooling is about as good as it gets. I'd be hard pressed to
see a better JSF tool.
With JSF you have this whole
set of custom tags, and if you need to do something slightly out of the
ordinary, you end up with a complete mess. Below is an example of such a
mess which I had to do because I need to use the <table>, <tr> and <td>
tags
within a <x:datatable> tag. The only way to do that was to use the
<f:verbatim> tag to tell the rendering engine to include the wrapped HTML
at
that exact location in the resulting page. Starts to feel like the 80/20
rule...
Well, Aaron, as long as I've known you, you have this issue that everything
should work exactly the way you expect it to, and if it doesn't, then it's
the tool's fault. I'm not saying that's either right or wrong, but unless
you take the time to find out how the tool is intended to work, it's likely
that you're going to have some issues using it properly.
With DDS, it's pretty straightforward. Consider that the lugnut wrench.
Pretty easy to use a lugnut wrench. Well, until you get to subfiles, at
which point most of us learned that from copying someone's working example.
So now you're more along the lines of a spark plug gapper. Still pretty
simple, but you have to think ahead a little bit before you use it. You
need to know what to set the gap to before you can use it.
The browser tools are light years ahead of that. They have to magically
cross two or three language boundaries, interpret multiple protocols, and in
many cases support logging and debugging features. They're much more along
the lines of the computerized analyzer, and while you may be able to stumble
your way through them without help, it's highly unlikely.
For your particular issue, for example, I learned to use the h:JspPanel tag,
which mimics the f:verbatim tag but in a much easier to use way, in my
opinion.
I will tell you this: JSF is not meant to be hand-coded. It's meant to be
manipulated by tools. I didn't like that at first, and a lot of the "real
programmers only need a text editor" types don't like it either, but frankly
my ego no longer depends on me being able to hand-type every line of code.
I'll let the tool help me with the syntax. Ctrl-space is my friend <grin>.
Maybe EGL has a new approach to the problems I've had, but I don't
think it has been put to the test yet. That's why you have been getting
so much flack from me :-)
I'm not the one who's going to decide that for you, Aaron. Only you can do
so, but you need to learn the tool. Have you taken any of the tutorials?
Any of the free remote learning courses?
Have you developed what you consider an Enterprise level application with
EGL? I don't believe I got an answer back from you the last time I asked
in our previous debate.
That's impossible to say, because I don't know what you consider enterprise
level. Remember, I'm an integrator so I spend most of my time making sure
the pieces work, and right now I'm pretty comfortable that all the pieces
are there. I can build a pretty nifty, barebones AJAX-enabled application
with an RPG back end in minutes. That's about all I need to fell
comfortable that the system is Enterprise ready.
Is there something specific you consider "Enterprise level"? Or maybe you
could ask IBM to give you an example. Or perhaps you could contact Bleddyn
Williams over at Morpheus; they've got a number of EGL customers. Here's a
case study from IBM and Morpheus:
http://www-306.ibm.com/software/success/cssdb.nsf/CS/WJBN-74XQPQ?OpenDocumen
t&Site=software&cty=en_us
Or maybe you've got an example that you can point to and you can outline the
pieces that make it enterprise ready.
Joe
midrange.com
