IT Mill

Part I. Developer's Guide
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Part I. Developer's Guide

Table of Contents

1. Introduction

Goals and Philosophy
Background
Changes in IT Mill Toolkit Release 5

Example Application Walkthrough

Hello World!
Calculator

What's Inside the IT Mill Toolkit Package?

Installing
Package Contents
Starting the Content Browser
Running the Demo Applications

Getting Development Environment Up and Running

Installing Java SDK
Installing Eclipse IDE
Installing Apache Tomcat
Firefox and Firebug

QuickStart with Eclipse

Importing IT Mill Toolkit as a Project
How to Run the Demo Applications in Eclipse?
How to Debug the Demo Applications in Eclipse?
Using QuickStart as a Project Skeleton

Your First Project with IT Mill Toolkit

Creating the Project
Including IT Mill Toolkit Libraries
Writing the Code
Defining Deployment Descriptor
Ready to Go!
Starting the Web Server
Running and Debugging

2. Architecture

Technological Background

AJAX
Google Web Toolkit
JSON

Client-Side Engine

Events and Listeners

3. Writing a Web Application

Managing the Main Window

Child Windows

Opening and Closing a Child Window
Window Positioning
Modal Windows

Application-Level Windows

Creating New Application-Level Windows
Creating Windows Dynamically
Caveats in Using Multiple Windows

Referencing Resources

Resource Interfaces and Classes
File Resources
Class Loader Resources
Theme Resources
Stream Resources

Error Handling

Error Indicator

Application Environment

Creating Deployable WAR in Eclipse
Web Application Contents
Deployment Descriptor web.xml

Embedding Applications in Web Pages

Embedding Inside a <div> Element
Embedding Inside an <iframe> Element

4. User Interface Components

Calendar

Selecting Items

Basic Select Component
Native Selection Component NativeSelect
Radio Button and Check Box Groups with OptionGroup
Twin Column Selection with TwinColSelect
Allowing Adding New Items
Multiple Selection Mode

Scrollable Tables
Paging Tables
List Tables

Progress Indicator

Doing Heavy Computation

Custom Composite Components

CustomComponent

Common Component Features

Sizing Components Through Sizeable

5. Managing Layout

Background for Layout

Layout Components

Ordered Layout
Grid layout
Panel
Tab Sheet
Expanding Layout

Controlling Layout Formatting

Layout Cell Alignment
Layout Cell Spacing
Layout Margins

Custom Layouts

Introduction to Cascading Style Sheets

Basic CSS Rules
Matching by Element Class
Matching by Descendant Relationship
Notes on Compatibility

Creating and Using Themes

Styling Standard Components
Using Themes
Theme Inheritance

7. Data Model

Overview
Properties
Holding properties in Items
Collecting items in Containers

8. Developing Custom Components

Google Web Toolkit Widgets

Extending an IT Mill Toolkit Widget
Example: A Color Picker GWT Widget
Styling GWT Widgets

Integrating a GWT Widget

Deserialization of Component State from Server
Serialization of Component State to Server
Example: Integrating the Color Picker Widget

Defining a Widget Set

GWT Module Descriptor

Server-Side Components

Server-Client Serialization
Client-Server Deserialization
Extending Standard Components
Example: Color Picker Server-Side Component

Using a Custom Component

Example: Color Picker Application
Web Application Deployment

GWT Widget Development

Creating a Widget Project in Eclipse
Importing GWT Installation Package
Creating a GWT Module
Compiling GWT Widget Sets
Ready to Run
Hosted Mode Browser

9. Advanced Web Application Topics

Special Characteristics of AJAX Applications

URI Handlers
Parameter Handlers

Java Servlet Parameters

Shortcut Keys

10. User Interface Definition Language (UIDL)

API for Painting Components
JSON Rendering
UIDL Syntax

Bibliography

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