I don’t agree with how Servoy moderates on their forum*
Published by admin on
Thursday, February 4, 2010 - 03:50:50
- Filed under General, News
I didn’t write here for a while and I apologize: I have been so much occupied improving/fixing/documenting/testing/polishing my Browser Suite that I didn’t find the time and energy to write about it lately.
Still I’m here and I keep working on Servoy during the day, and doing my bit for the community during the evening (should I say the night?). And I keep looking in the Servoy forum for bits and pieces, tips and tricks, news and discussions.
Today I have read a post from David Workman from Data Mosaic, which was raising some serious questions and expressing some concerns about the state of the Servoy community and the attitude of Servoy towards it, with some sort of statistical proof to it. I thought that some of his points were fair enough and I was interesting in following this thread to learn what Servoy and other fellow developers would have to say in reaction to it.
So I was but little abashed to see that this post just simply disappeared!
I know this is not the first time, but it really annoys me to see that valid concerns from a developer who invested so much in Servoy and its community for years (indeed, he created a whole business aroung it!) would simply be dismissed in such a way. IMHO it just proves how valid some of David concerns can be related to Servoy management attitude towards us developers who are trying to work as partners with them.
So I decided to reproduce it here in full (thanks to google cache). I will simply say that I don’t always agree with David - especially when it comes to Mac and Java ;-) - but I think he expresses here some valid points that should not just disappear, so here it is - as it was written:
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Browser Suite v0.9 coming soon to a website near you!
Published by admin on
Monday, December 21, 2009 - 05:55:48
- Filed under General, News, Announcements, Development
Hi there!
For those of you expecting the end of the story, I’m asking for a little bit of patience…
Right now, I’m hard at work on the Browser Suite (for a change ;-), currently writing an extended documentation with (hopefully useful!) explanations of all the properties and methods, tips and tricks and examples of usage. All this in a nice PDF with table of contents, screen captures, and all the bells and whistles…
And while I’m working on the doc, I made a few changes to method names and signatures, mainly harmonizing the names to better match Servoy’s conventions like calling the event methods with a name starting by “onXXXX”, adding a JSEvent first parameter to all the event callbacks, adding comments to the sample solution and generally fixing everything I can (while I can).
Which means that there will be a few changes here and there, and if you are already using the Browser Suite you will need to adapt your scripts (nothing major, though :).
I thought that since the suite is not yet production-ready, it was now or never to harmonize all this stuff. Once the suite reaches v1.0, I will make sure to keep backward compatibility from then on.
So, with an up to date documentation (that will be included, as an optional install package, in the installer), this will lead to a brand new 0.9 version, where every methods and properties names will be fixed for the future… And only bug fixes for the rest of the cycle until v1.0
You can expect this version between now and next year :)
In the meantime, let me send you my virtual wishes for a happy new decade!
Open list of bugs to vote for in the Eclipse bugzilla system
Published by admin on
Monday, December 7, 2009 - 05:25:43
- Filed under General, News, Development
There has not been too much activity on the Eclipse bugzilla system lately, related to the bugs we (Christopher Deckers and myself) uncovered with our port of the DJ-NativeSwing library in the Browser Suite for Servoy… so I’m putting here a list of direct links to the opened bugs asking you to vote for their resolutions if you intend to use the Browser Suite in the future, because you (or your client) will be affected by them.
These ones are all Mac OS X related (but surely you have Mac clients too?):
- https://bugs.eclipse … ow_bug.cgi?id=291326
[SWT/AWT] Freeze when making a sync SWT call in response to certain Swing events
- https://bugs.eclipse … ow_bug.cgi?id=291705
SWT_AWT: new Browser SWT.MOZILLA gives NPE in MozillaDelegate
- https://bugs.eclipse … ow_bug.cgi?id=291328
[SWT_AWT] NPE when accessing a browser custom context menu
- https://bugs.eclipse … ow_bug.cgi?id=295795
[SWT_AWT] Popup menu in browser freezes app
- https://bugs.eclipse … ow_bug.cgi?id=295794
[SWT_AWT] App freezes when tooltips are called in browser - NOW FIXED!
- https://bugs.eclipse … ow_bug.cgi?id=295792
[SWT] Browser issue: open a window from link or script doesn’t work
- https://bugs.eclipse … ow_bug.cgi?id=293276
[Browser] SWT_AWT: can’t type in MOZILLA Browser HTML fields - NOW FIXED!
These ones are Windows specific and might or might not affect you or your users:
- https://bugs.eclipse … ow_bug.cgi?id=221235
[Browser-IE] VisibilityWindowListener.show() is not called
- https://bugs.eclipse … how_bug.cgi?id=90023
Browser 3D content border not consistent
- https://bugs.eclipse … how_bug.cgi?id=84532
[browser] Browser widget does not send focus events
On Linux there is this one that I know of:
- https://bugs.eclipse … ow_bug.cgi?id=225401
[SWT_AWT] Removing the AWT Canvas generates a Gtk-CRITICAL message
For all platform, this one fix could also help:
- https://bugs.eclipse … ow_bug.cgi?id=292062
Provide a way to dynamically introspect an SWT port info
Voting for the resolution of these bugs is as easy as registering on the Eclipse bugzilla system (you won’t get any spam from them!), and clicking on the ‘vote’ link on the pages above, so I say it again: if you intend to use the browser suite in the near future, it is impotant that these bugs are fixed, otherwise you or your clients will suffer from them…
You can also comment if you like, stating that these bugs are actually delaying the need you have of an SWT port on Servoy, this will be true.
Thanks in advance!
Java Web (doesn’t) Start
Published by admin on
Tuesday, December 1, 2009 - 06:10:56
- Filed under General, News, Development
That’s what you could call this wonderful technology that Sun created a while ago, to easily deploy rich clients on any(!) platform, providing that this platform have a proper JRE installed.
And true to its usual motto: ‘write once, debug everywhere!”, Java Web Start actually works great… most of the time. Because then again, you have the usual black sheep (Mac OS X, you’ve recognized it) that never really does thing like any other… One might say that it is a blessing, and sometimes that’s quite true, but when it comes to Java, I’m afraid it is rather a curse.
So, the first step was to make the DJ-NativeSwing demo app work from Java Web Start (JWS for those who love abbreviations) on all the target platform: Windows, Linux and Mac OS X. Armed with the latest SWT nightly build I thought it would be a piece of cake. True for Windows and Linux, although there was the occasionnal tweaking of a few flags, like the infamous -Dsun.awt.disableMixing=true (this one will really be used from Java 6u18 onwards, but I’ve tried it on early release, - to be on the safe side:).
On Mac OS X, I managed to make this work, on Leopard (10.5.8) using Java 5 32/64-bit and Java 6 64-bit only (because in its infinite wisdom, Apple decided not to release any Java 6 32-bit for Leopard, only for the new Snow Leopard - 10.6 - go figure!). So it was working fine on Leopard, and I decided that it would be nice to try it on Tiger (the previous beast: 10.4.x), because there is Java 5 available and I thought that it would be nice to be able to say to users that this stuff was compatible Tiger or more…
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So what’s wrong with Mac OS X?
Published by admin on
Thursday, November 26, 2009 - 04:45:36
- Filed under General, News, Development
Only one small thing: Java.
Right now there are no less than 7 bugs related to the use of the SWT/SWT_AWT Browser opened for the Mac OS X platform on the Eclipse bugzilla system.
These bugs affects the browser suite on the platform, and even if you develop on Windows or Linux, your client may be on Mac so you will be affected too! All this to say that if you have 5 minutes to spare, please vote for a quick fix of these bugs - just register on the eclipse.org site, and add your vote.(You will see the complete list with some explanations in the Browser Suite FAQ pdf, just look at the last chapter: What are the know issues/bugs?)
And yet the worst ones, those which made me doubt that there ever will be a Mac OS X version, are now all fixed!
First there is the problem with the architecture. For those, like me, coming from the old days of Apple, you know that once upon a time there was a very special system, Mac OS, which was revolutionary then but whose binaries where not easily portable… The ROM of the Mac hardware was making all the difference because a good part of the system was already there, and notably UI code.
I still have the first 5 volumes of “Inside Macintosh” - the programmer’s bible, which still today are very good UI guidelines. There was the fundation of almost every UI widgets you use everyday.
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Moving forward, getting deeper…
Published by admin on
Monday, November 23, 2009 - 03:55:59
- Filed under General, News, Development
So I was happy with my little integration of DJ-NativeSwing as a plugin (3 plugins in fact: one for the browser, one for the flash player and one for the html editor).
I knew that they would be better implemented as beans because they were real components, and they had a UI, so I needed to rewrite the whole thing to make this easier to use, and make them Servoy-Aware (you can attach a data provider to them) and have a bunch of properties and event callbacks, and still be fully scriptable… Quite a lot to write, really, although I could sense that the DJ-NativeSwing API was solid and well written and allowed for all of this.
I had some discussions in PM about that with a few Servoy users, and I sensed that there was some real interest but all I could tell these guys was that there was no support for Mac OS X yet.
Still I tried, mostly stealing Mac time from colleagues at work, to try deploying DJ-NativeSwing with SWT, and trying MozSwing as well, and even plain Mozilla XULRunner to see what was working or not and trying to understand why.
I had tons of trouble finding a way to deploy XULRunner from JNLP using an <installer-desc> node.
Most of the times it was just not working, and sometimes it had the weirdest of behaviours, like launching an instance of windows in Parallels Desktop for example! I’m telling you: Java Web Start is a very strange beast! And on Mac OS X particularly. In the end I wrote my own XULRunner installer that I can rely on, or at least debug ;-)
I managed to make the MozSwing demo to work on Mac OS X Tiger, but couldn’t make DJ-NativeSwing to launch at all. I even started to think that maybe I could write a regular implementation on Windows/Linux and a special (limited) implementation using MozSwing for Mac OS X. Easier said than done.
In the meantime I did the SVGBean, and was quite happy about it, but I still had these plugins waiting for me in my Eclipse workspace, and I was playing around that from time to time. I knew that if I was to embark on that thing, it could take a big effort to release it to the public.
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How to finish a big project to start an even bigger one…
Published by admin on
Sunday, November 22, 2009 - 06:37:29
- Filed under General, News, Development
I can tell you that’s what happened to me 3 months ago.
I was happy to have finally finished my marathon series of tutorials on how to build Servoy-Aware java beans for Servoy, with a web compatible bean and all the bells and whistles. A bit fed up with MS Word as a primary tool, to tell you the truth: there’s not even code completion in this thing!
So it was a good time to rest a little and enjoy some free time experimenting a few of the mad stuff I had in mind without having to explain every single line of code (which actually goes a lot quicker :)
So I went back to one of my pet project (I have a few - don’t ask), this one started with the disgust I had with the java HTMLEditorKit class: the base of all html rendering/editing in pure Java. The worst piece of software that Sun has ever made, if you ask me.
So I thought: I can’t be alone frustrated with this stuff! Surely there are some clever guys out there who have found a better way to deal with html rendering and editing in Java. And I googled for it, believe me, I did. But felt even more depressed after that:
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The browser Suite is here! Check it out!
Published by admin on
Friday, November 20, 2009 - 03:18:45
- Filed under News, Announcements, Development, Plugins/beans, Servoy, Java
As demonstrated ‘live’ during Servoy Camp by the mysterious Mister P. (ask Bob Cusik about it) this ’sweet’ suite of native components (Web Browser, Flash Player and Html Editor) is ready for you to try on Servoy 5!
You will find it on the related page of the main site.
Soon on this very blog you will hear everything about the making of this stuff, all the nitty, all the gritty, all the details… but first I have to recover from a very bad flu thanks to the nice Denham climate.
You will hear about the battle to get this stuff work on all major platforms, why Mac OS X is such a case in itself and all the fun stuff involving Mac threading model, the Eclipse SWT bugzilla system being my best friend, how I went to Canada to work with a french guy with 6h delay in communication, and generally why I was so quiet during these last weeks…
I could write a book about it, but fear not, I will spare you the thread dump ;-)
Soon I will put up a google-code site or sourceforge.net site to give access to the source. I still need to find a way to publish the 4 related Eclipse projects along with the configuration stuff and installer related files in an easy to use SVN or CVS repository, with as little manual tweaking required as possible.
In the meantime, if you do try the stuff, I’d like to hear about it: the whole idea of releasing this stuff before v1 is to get as much feedback as possible on the widest range of configurations, uses and abuses, and get as much DETAILED report as possible.
So email me your bug reports, feature requests, suggestions, comments, insults and everything you want to say about it, using the contact form or via PM on the Servoy forum.
No fuss, no Stuff?
Published by admin on
Wednesday, November 4, 2009 - 03:59:44
- Filed under General, News, Announcements
Yeah, I know, I have been very quiet lately…
I’m sorry about it. It shouldn’t be long now before I put some very new stuff on the web site and I will explain everything IN DETAILS to everyone interested. Promised.
In the meantime I did some cleaning in this blog and unfortunately I had to disable comments so you will only be able to send me comment using the email function. This is only because I was tired of deleting these pesky link to russian porn crap every day or so, it seems the anti-spam system of this blog is not powerful enough, so I will need to see later what I can do about it.
Thanks to the sad buggers who find nothing more interesting to do with their lives than polluting others web site, for the very dubious gain of one more link to their erotic crap and viruses!
The only good news today is that I updated the SVG bean to support full transparency (you will find 2 new properties on the bean: background and opaque - both scriptable as well), you can download the new version from the SVGBean related page on the main Servoy Stuff site.
Going to Europe for the next two weeks so don’t expect much more news but when I will be back, I will be back for good! ;-)
Cheers!
One small step… one small blog post
Published by admin on
Wednesday, August 26, 2009 - 04:45:26
- Filed under News, Announcements, Development, Plugins/beans
Servoy 4.1.4 was announced on the forum, so I dutifully updated my developer’s version today, and checked for bugs in the plugins and beans I made available yet.
They changed the IStylePropertyChange interface (used in Wicket components) to integrate 2 new methods. These same method that we can see in the public API for Servoy 5.x.x. so the beans were not working anymore in the Web client. But I’m not complaining, because this is one small step towards Servoy 5!
Anyway, I adapted the code of the DateChooserBean and the ServoySliderBean accordingly (as well as the simple TestBean project made for the bean tutorial - part 5).
If you are using these beans, please update to the new version that you will find on the Servoy Stuff main site on the DateChooserBean page and the ServoySliderBean page respectively.
Stay tuned for some bigger news soon ;-)
