A while back , I wrote an article for O’Reilly’s sister site , Java.net about How to add Ajax to your Struts Application. While it was pretty straightfoward (as is Ajax underneath all the hype), it still involved a little to much JavaScript for my liking. Nothing against JavaScript, but if you write it , you have to support it. Far better to use a standard Ajax library , like DWR , Prototype or Dojo.

So , along comes Struts 2. Be careful - it’s good , but a different beast under the covers from Struts 1. It does a lot of things better - for example , the way it has Actions as normal POJO’s makes it a lot of things easier to unit test.

Struts 2 also gives you Ajax ‘out of the box’. No writing of javascript, no debugging against various browsers; just configure and go. A full description of how to setup Struts 2 to use Ajax is in this wiki article. The quick version is:

1. Setup Struts 2
2. Add the Struts-Ajax URL and Div Tag.

That’s it. Ajax without the fuss.

Even better that the Struts guys have implemented the Ajax functionality using the Prototype Ajax Library, so you get the benefit of all the improvements there.

What do you think? Will you move to Struts 2 just for the new Ajax capabilities?

Red Hat and Exadel announced an exciting strategic partnership. Exadel is contributing their commercial products, RichFaces and Exadel Studio Pro, to open source at jboss.org. The Ajax4jsf project has also moved to jboss.org as JBoss Ajax4jsf.

The Ajax4jsf framework is implemented using a component library that adds AJAX capability to your existing pages without having to write any JavaScript code or replace existing components with new AJAX widgets. Ajax4jsf also takes full advantage of the benefits of the JSF framework including lifecycle, validation, and conversion facilities, along with the management of static and dynamic resources.Shunmuga Raja writes about ajax4jsf here .

Introduction to Ajax4Jsf

On 29 June, Eclipse community will be richer for the new Europa release. It is a coordinate release of 21 Eclipse Foundation projects. The main component of this release is certainly new 3.3 version of the Eclipse Platform. Others include prominent projects from domains of administration, modeling, development and tools, such as Eclipse Communications Framework (ECF), Eclipse Modeling Framework Project (EMF), Dynamic Languages Tool Kit (DLTK) and Business Intelligence Reporting Tools (BIRT).
This is definitely an important Eclipse release and a good news for all Eclipse users.

The Streaming API for XML (StAX) is a groundbreaking new Java API for parsing and writing XML easily and efficiently.StAX provides is the latest API in the JAXP family, and provides an alternative to SAX, DOM, TrAX, and DOM for developers looking to do high-performance stream filtering, processing, and modification, particularly with low memory and limited extensibility requirements. Here you can read the full article

Streaming API for XML

If you build an application that integrates ActiveMQ broker, it makes sense that you want to integrate its web console as well. It provides your users with basic monitoring and management operations. One road you can take is to integrate it as a WAR archive, but as you already have a whole lot of ActiveMQ integrated, you probably want to include just necessary subset of libraries and files and always have most up to date version of it.

This integrations is not as seamless as it probably should be, but here are a couple of steps I found do the job for me (and hope can help someone else with the same requirements). I use Maven2 as a build tool and its assembly plugin to create a final distribution. If you are using some different building environment it is probably the best to stick with customized WAR archive.

Java 6 provides the Common Scripting Language Framework for integrating various Scripting Languages into the Java Platform. Most of the popular Scripting Languages like Java Script, PHP Script, Bean Shell Script and PNuts Script etc., can be seamlessly integrated with the Java Platform. Support for Intercommunication between Scripting Languages and Java Programs is possible now because of this. It means that Scripting Language Code can access the Set of Java Libraries and Java Programs can directly embed Scripting Code. Java Applications can also have options for Compiling and Executing Scripts which will lead to good performance, provided the Scripting Engine supports this feature. ShunmugaRaja explains in detail here

Scripting Language for the Java Platform

I maintain a certain fascination with Blu-Ray, against my better judgement, and this blog is an attempt to pull many thoughts and facts together. It starts with Dragon’s Lair… because these things always start with Dragon’s Lair.