Re: [xul-talk] Is Mozilla XUL Development too hard?
On Wed, Dec 03, 2003 at 06:03:06PM -0800, Gerald Bauer wrote : > > But I completely agree that a proper > > first-user friendly > > documentation is definitely missing. > >Let's hope the new 800-page Mozilla XUL book by > Nigel McFarlane upcoming any minute now will break new > ground and fill the gap left by the last two XUL > books, that is, "Essential XUL Programming" and > "Creating Applications with Mozilla (Using XUL, > JavaScript and CSS)". > > The good news about the new 800-page Mozilla XUL > book is that a free pdf version will be available. The > bad news is that it will only be available a couple of > months after the book got published. I'm awaiting this book since I've first heard of it (around September I guess) and already ordered it. I'm really excited about it; I just hope it will arive before christmas and that I'll have enough time to dig through it. - Markus --- This SF.net email is sponsored by: SF.net Giveback Program. Does SourceForge.net help you be more productive? Does it help you create better code? SHARE THE LOVE, and help us help YOU! Click Here: http://sourceforge.net/donate/ ___ xul-talk mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/xul-talk
Re: [xul-talk] Is Mozilla XUL Development too hard?
> But I completely agree that a proper > first-user friendly > documentation is definitely missing. Let's hope the new 800-page Mozilla XUL book by Nigel McFarlane upcoming any minute now will break new ground and fill the gap left by the last two XUL books, that is, "Essential XUL Programming" and "Creating Applications with Mozilla (Using XUL, JavaScript and CSS)". The good news about the new 800-page Mozilla XUL book is that a free pdf version will be available. The bad news is that it will only be available a couple of months after the book got published. - Gerald --- This SF.net email is sponsored by: SF.net Giveback Program. Does SourceForge.net help you be more productive? Does it help you create better code? SHARE THE LOVE, and help us help YOU! Click Here: http://sourceforge.net/donate/ ___ xul-talk mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/xul-talk
Re: [xul-talk] Is Mozilla XUL Development too hard?
On Wed, Dec 03, 2003 at 08:05:55AM -0800, Gerald Bauer wrote : > Ken Walker writes in his blog story: [shortened Ken Walkers blog] > [...] What I didn?t > see (as a browser end user) was that the entire > browser itself was being rendered with the Gecko > engine?a clever, intuitive application framework had > been invented. I only became aware of this fact last > year when I was researching cross-platform development > tools for my Senior Project. Then I started to realize > XUL?s potential. > > I suspect a lot of people are still where I was a > couple years ago?looking at Mozilla and saying, > ?what?s the big deal?? I second this. That's exactly the same "problem" I had in the first. Keen, enthusiastic developers sometimes only realize too late what power they may have used unter mozillas hood. It is not that it is too late. But some more pr work would have prevented this from happening. - Markus --- This SF.net email is sponsored by: SF.net Giveback Program. Does SourceForge.net help you be more productive? Does it help you create better code? SHARE THE LOVE, and help us help YOU! Click Here: http://sourceforge.net/donate/ ___ xul-talk mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/xul-talk
Re: [xul-talk] Is Mozilla XUL Development too hard?
On Wed, Dec 03, 2003 at 10:31:18PM +, Charles Goodwin wrote : > On Wed, 2003-12-03 at 20:51, Mike Hostetler wrote: > > Connecting XUL with a more flexible language such as > > PHP is also very hard. > > That's one of the things that the project I work on addresses - it > mandates UI and application separation where the UI is in XWT's form of > (don't sue me) XUL and the application in a language of choice. The > communication is either XMLRPC or SOAP, both very common and well > implemented protocols. > > However, I do not know how Mozilla addresses this. I am not sure if I'm following this correctly; forgive me if not. The link would be to use the XmlHttpRequestObject [1] (sp?) when you start your (Mozilla) XUL application. You then send your GET/POST requests to the server and receive/parse the response. But I completely agree that a proper first-user friendly documentation is definitely missing. - Markus [1] http://www.mozilla.org/xmlextras/ --- This SF.net email is sponsored by: SF.net Giveback Program. Does SourceForge.net help you be more productive? Does it help you create better code? SHARE THE LOVE, and help us help YOU! Click Here: http://sourceforge.net/donate/ ___ xul-talk mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/xul-talk
Re: [xul-talk] Is Mozilla XUL Development too hard?
On Wed, 2003-12-03 at 22:49, Markus Fischer wrote: > I am not sure if I'm following this correctly; forgive me if not. > > The link would be to use the XmlHttpRequestObject [1] (sp?) when you > start your (Mozilla) XUL application. You then send your GET/POST > requests to the server and receive/parse the response. In the case of XWT, the application is split into two parts, client and server. The client is the XWT core plus your XUL UI definition. The server is whatever you choose it to be, implementing a SOAP or XMLRPC API for the client to probe. XMLRPC and SOAP are implemented over HTTP but not GET/POST related. They are much quicker and more practical. People forget that HTML was/is designed to be a document markup language and nothing else. The whole forms and dHTML business is a mutated monster that is probably best forgotten. Sadly, that won't happen for reasons-a-many. > But I completely agree that a proper first-user friendly > documentation is definitely missing. Yes, definitely. That's something I've been working on wrt to XWT, creating documents that introduce even the most ignorant to creating XUL applications using XWT. Apologies in advance for all the XUL references. I've yet to think of a more appropriate term, and somebody is yet to point out a valid trademark reference. ;) - Charlie -- Charles Goodwin <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> XWT Foundation - www.xwt.org --- This SF.net email is sponsored by: SF.net Giveback Program. Does SourceForge.net help you be more productive? Does it help you create better code? SHARE THE LOVE, and help us help YOU! Click Here: http://sourceforge.net/donate/ ___ xul-talk mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/xul-talk
Re: [xul-talk] Is Mozilla XUL Development too hard?
On Wed, Dec 03, 2003 at 10:31:18PM +, Charles Goodwin wrote : > On Wed, 2003-12-03 at 20:51, Mike Hostetler wrote: > > Connecting XUL with a more flexible language such as > > PHP is also very hard. > > That's one of the things that the project I work on addresses - it > mandates UI and application separation where the UI is in XWT's form of > (don't sue me) XUL and the application in a language of choice. The > communication is either XMLRPC or SOAP, both very common and well > implemented protocols. > > However, I do not know how Mozilla addresses this. I am not sure if I'm following this correctly; forgive me if not. The link would be to use the XmlHttpRequestObject [1] (sp?) when you start your (Mozilla) XUL application. You then send your GET/POST requests to the server and receive/parse the response. But I completely agree that a proper first-user friendly documentation is definitely missing. - Markus [1] http://www.mozilla.org/xmlextras/ --- This SF.net email is sponsored by: SF.net Giveback Program. Does SourceForge.net help you be more productive? Does it help you create better code? SHARE THE LOVE, and help us help YOU! Click Here: http://sourceforge.net/donate/ ___ xul-talk mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/xul-talk
Re: [xul-talk] Is Mozilla XUL Development too hard?
On Wed, 2003-12-03 at 20:51, Mike Hostetler wrote: > Connecting XUL with a more flexible language such as > PHP is also very hard. That's one of the things that the project I work on addresses - it mandates UI and application separation where the UI is in XWT's form of (don't sue me) XUL and the application in a language of choice. The communication is either XMLRPC or SOAP, both very common and well implemented protocols. However, I do not know how Mozilla addresses this. - Charlie -- Charles Goodwin <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> XWT Foundation - www.xwt.org --- This SF.net email is sponsored by: SF.net Giveback Program. Does SourceForge.net help you be more productive? Does it help you create better code? SHARE THE LOVE, and help us help YOU! Click Here: http://sourceforge.net/donate/ ___ xul-talk mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/xul-talk
Re: [xul-talk] Is Mozilla XUL Development too hard?
Connecting XUL with a more flexible language such as PHP is also very hard. When I first started out on my journey to find a way to accomplish this, I ran into a number of problems. It was after a great deal of searching, reading some hard to find list posts, and a great deal of experimentation I finally figured out how to connect my XUL application with PHP. While layers could be developed to make this easier, it's frustrating for people to get involved with XUL because of the background they currently need to create something useful. --- This SF.net email is sponsored by: SF.net Giveback Program. Does SourceForge.net help you be more productive? Does it help you create better code? SHARE THE LOVE, and help us help YOU! Click Here: http://sourceforge.net/donate/ ___ xul-talk mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/xul-talk
Re: [xul-talk] Is Mozilla XUL Development too hard?
On Wed, Dec 03, 2003 at 08:05:55AM -0800, Gerald Bauer wrote : > Ken Walker writes in his blog story: [shortened Ken Walkers blog] > [...] What I didn?t > see (as a browser end user) was that the entire > browser itself was being rendered with the Gecko > engine?a clever, intuitive application framework had > been invented. I only became aware of this fact last > year when I was researching cross-platform development > tools for my Senior Project. Then I started to realize > XUL?s potential. > > I suspect a lot of people are still where I was a > couple years ago?looking at Mozilla and saying, > ?what?s the big deal?? I second this. That's exactly the same "problem" I had in the first. Keen, enthusiastic developers sometimes only realize too late what power they may have used unter mozillas hood. It is not that it is too late. But some more pr work would have prevented this from happening. - Markus --- This SF.net email is sponsored by: SF.net Giveback Program. Does SourceForge.net help you be more productive? Does it help you create better code? SHARE THE LOVE, and help us help YOU! Click Here: http://sourceforge.net/donate/ ___ xul-talk mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/xul-talk
[xul-talk] Is Mozilla XUL Development too hard?
Hi, The blogsphere is a buzz to discuss the question "Is Mozilla XU Development too hard?". Dan comments: Its not too hard. They just dont know that it exists. If theyve heard of XUL, they think its Netscapes proprietary DHTML stuff. Its a PR problem. Neil Deakin (of XUL Planet fame) comments from outer space: Not really. There are over 100 extensions that show it can't be that difficult. Phil Wilson weighs in with his own blog story: Im extraordinarily keen to develop applications with Mozilla. I would absolutely love to be able to write an application which used XUL as its front end, giving me a nice, cross-platform interface. Ive put a lot of time and effort into various Java solutions: Swing, SWT, XWT, Thinlet, Jelly, but none have been completely satisfactory, always letting me down in some way or another. As you can tell, my programming language of choice is Java, and for me RDF and XUL arent a problem, in fact I positively embrace both of them, but I have no idea at all of how to link a Java app to an XUL front end except by means of a web service which I can call from Javascript! I have a vague idea that JNI exists and would probably be useful here (as, most likely, would XPIDL and XPCOM), but whilst I understand how to make calls between basic C++ and Java apps using JNI, I have absolutely no idea how this relates in the real world to Mozilla, or even would relate to a GRE or XRE. I'm pretty sure that XPCOM is the crux of the thing, but even that has more than one front page on the Mozilla site: XPCOM the project, and XPCOM the architecture. In all fariness, the XPCOM architecture page looks great, and seems to link to some good resources, but I swear I'd not seen half of them before, and am going to put down this new discovery to the reworking of mozilla.org ;) But regardless, there's too much text and not enough code. What I need is a simple example of how I can take input from the user in XUL, pass it back to my Java code which updates the user interface. If only Creating Applications with Mozilla told me! Newsmonster, for example, is written wholly in Java (AFAIK!) and so its clearly possbile, but god knows how its done I certainly havent been able to find any examples of how to get started. I also know about the Blackwood project, the aim of which is: Creating a bridge between the Java Platform and Mozilla, but a quick look at the checkins shows nothings happened since Jan 2002! All of which means that Im sitting here, full of enthusiasm and verve, and I have no idea of how to even start. Who can point me in the right direction? (Source: http://pipthepixie.tripod.com/blog/archive/2003_12_01_blog.html#107040973084959751 ) Ken Walker writes in his blog story: I should have asked Is Mozilla Development Too Esoteric?not too difficult. I can attest that within a few hours of playing with XUL, I was able to get some widgets working and provide basic functionality behind them. Designing in XUL/CSS is as easy as designing websites, and JavaScript is a flexible, easy language to write in. So, I would assume that the problem isnt technological, but sociopolitical. When Mozilla 1.0 came out just a few years ago, I thought the technology breakthrough was the browser. I downloaded it and was disappointed. There was nothing new here but the same old ugly Netscape. What I didnt see (as a browser end user) was that the entire browser itself was being rendered with the Gecko enginea clever, intuitive application framework had been invented. I only became aware of this fact last year when I was researching cross-platform development tools for my Senior Project. Then I started to realize XULs potential. I suspect a lot of people are still where I was a couple years agolooking at Mozilla and saying, whats the big deal? (Source: http://www.kennsarah.net/archives/2003/11/28/is_mozilla_development_too_hard ) Any comments? - Gerald --- This SF.net email is sponsored by: SF.net Giveback Program. Does SourceForge.net help you be more productive? Does it help you create better code? SHARE THE LOVE, and help us help YOU! Click Here: http://sourceforge.net/donate/ ___ xul-talk mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/xul-talk
