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| AJAX Platform Released as Open Source Developers now have a fast, efficient and cost-effective way to create AJAX-enabled rich Internet applications with the release of ClearNova's, ThinkCAP JX - the first rapid application development (RAD) platform to be offered as open source, and the first visual development environment for building rich Internet applications. ThinkCAP JX combines the power of AJAX, J2EE and open source to enable organizations and their developers to build the web-based applications that run their businesses. ThinkCAP JX is available for download athttp://www.thinkcap.org/In addition, in late February, the project web site will be the location for community feedback, shared experiences, bug fixes, feature requests and sharing knowledge with other users. ClearNova will provide training, consulting, maintenance and support for the product. In addition to releasing ThinkCAP JX under the GPL license for non-commercial distribution, ThinkCAP will also be available to those needing a commercial license & indemnification at a nominal price. AJAX Ushers in a New Era of Web-based Productivity AJAX (Asynchronous JavaScript and XML) is a set of programming techniques that allow Web applications to be much more responsive and provide usability on par with traditional client/server applications. Using AJAX techniques, applications can act on data and events as the user interacts with the system by communicating to the server and updating portions of a page immediately instead of always refreshing the entire page. The results are faster, more robust applications. Until now, AJAX development has been highly labor intensive and required very sophisticated programming skills and a complete change in how developers approach their work. ThinkCAP JX allows Java and 4GL developers to rapidly build applications without having to become JavaScript experts. ThinkCAP JX provides event-driven AJAX development so that developers can code on either the client or the server-or both; because developers can leverage Java to make changes to the user interface, it is easier for them to develop and maintain the application. ThinkCAP JX can also be used to add AJAX functionality to existing Java applications. The ThinkCAP JX Framework integrates almost 25 open source frameworks and engines including Struts and Hibernate and provides a seamless framework that ties them all together. It also adds value to open source through ThinkCAP Workbench, a highly visual design environment. At the core of ThinkCAP's AJAX framework are two popular open source AJAX projects: prototype and script.aculo.us. These libraries were chosen because they provide excellent base functionality but also because they are the two projects driving the AJAX functionality of the Ruby-On-Rails project and therefore are being frequently updated. Other open source and standards-based projects in ThinkCAP's core architecture are OpenRico, JUnit, log4J, JFreeChart, Apache Axis, Apache Commons (Validator, BeanUtils, Collections, Digester, and Logging), Castor, JEP, Jakarta (Oro, POI, and Regexp), Apache (Lucene, Batik, and Bcel), JavaTidy, and Xerces. ThinkCAP JX runs on any operating system and Java application servers such as IBM WebSphere, BEA Weblogic, Oracle 10g, Sybase EA Server, JBoss, Tomcat, Jetty, and Resin. The ThinkCAP JX Framework, available as open source via GPL or through a low-cost commercial license for redistribution, includes: -- AJAX powered 3-Tier Client/Server Framework - Allows developers to quickly build interactive, event-driven functionality utilizing the power of Java on the server and JavaScript on the client -- Rich Data-Aware Controls & Visual Effects - A full set of controls such as menus, outlook bars and accordion controls along with rich visual effects for building professional looking applications -- Dynamic Updateable Multi-Row Dataview - Extremely flexible, data-driven grid control giving developers unparalleled ability to create complex views of data -- Advanced Web Framework - A proven MVC (model-view-controller) framework based on Struts including a full client and server-side validation framework -- Extensive Event Model - Easy to program event model for all aspects of web application functionality including transactions, update control, actions, component lifecycle, and more. -- Extensibility and Openness - ThinkCAP includes more than 25 open source projects and brings them together in one cohesive framework -- Near-Codeless Data Persistence - Seamless integration of popular open-source Hibernate and Castor persistence engines -- Agile Development Support - Allows developers to validate and refine user requirements through rapidly built prototypes using "mock" data. write your comments about the article :: © 2006 Computing News :: home page |