Rich Internet Applications (RIAs) are applications that resemble desktop applications, and there are a variety of technologies available for implementing RIAs.  Independent of the framework or toolkit used for implementing the front-end of an RIA, all RIAs need to access logic and/or data that resides on the server.  Skyway Software is happy to announce a new code generation feature in Skyway Builder 6.3 to support the development of RIAs.

In Skyway Builder 6.3 Enterprise Edition (EE), we’ve added some development accelerators for exposing Spring DSL services and operations via Javascript using Direct Web Remoting (DWR).  DWR is “a Java library that enables Java on the server and JavaScript in a browser to interact and call each other as simply as possible.”  The DWR functionality in Skyway Builder makes it very easy (practically trivial) to make the functionality of Spring Services accessible to RIAs.

The DWR support in Skyway Builder 6.3 is very similar to the JAX-WS support in Skyway Builder.  Using the DWR tab on the Service, the developer can decide which Spring Services (@Service) are exposed using DWR.  The service is preconfigured using common conventions for the service and operations, but the DWR tab provides some additional configuration options.  By default, all the operations in the service are published with DWR.  If you want to exclude certain operations, you can highlight the operation in the DWR tab and check the “Exclude” option.

When a service is enabled, Skyway Builder will:

1. automatically bootstrap the Spring project to support DWR
2. automatically configure Spring and DWR for generating the Javascript libraries needed for accessing the Spring services

In addition to dynamically generating Javascript that can be used to access a Spring service, DWR will automatically generate some pages that can assist in developing and testing with DWR.

The DWR Service index page lists all the classes known to DWR, and it’s useful for verifying which Spring DSL services are, or are not, DWR enabled.  The URL for the accessing the index page is http://server:port/context/dwr/index.html.  Each service listed on the index page includes a hyperlink for accessing the DWR Service details page, and the details page lists the script includes (<script>) needed to use the DWR-enabled service from Javascript.  The name of the Javascript file is specified by the DWR configuration in the DWR tab.  The details page also includes a listing of all available Javascript methods.  There should be a Javascript method for every operation in the DWR-enabled service that wasn’t configured to be excluded.  Beside each Javascript function there is an “Execute” button that can be used for testing client/server communication prior to building the front-end that uses the Javascript functions.

Please remember that this is a feature preview.  Skyway Builder 6.3 should be available near the end of August.  To stay in the loop on the upcoming 6.3 release, please follow us on Twitter, become a fan of Skyway Builder on Facebook, or join the Skyway Community. As one of the many benefits of joining our community, you will automatically receive product announcements and updates.

Skyway Builder 6.3 Feature Preview Series

• Skyway Builder 6.3 Feature Preview – #1 Enhanced Spring MVC Scaffolding
• Skyway Builder 6.3 Feature Preview – #2 Model Packages
• Skyway Builder 6.3 Feature Preview – #3 Spring DSL Enhancements
• Skyway Builder 6.3 Feature Preview – #4 Configurable Spring Code Generation
• Skyway Builder 6.3 Feature Preview – #5 Custom Spring Templates using JET
• Skyway Builder 6.3 Feature Preview – #6 Spring Services via Javascript/JSON using DWR