Tutorial offers fast track to component integration -- ADTmag

Tutorial offers fast track to component integration

By Will Kilburn
July 25, 2003

If you're a J2EE developer, you've probably spent a considerable amount of time writing deployment descriptors and support code. The task can be arduous, but methods are coming along to ease the pain. One of these is XDoclet, a code-generation tool featured in a free tutorial on IBM's developerWorks site.

"XDoclet allows you to tack on meta data to language features like classes, methods and fields using what looks like JavaDoc tags. It then uses that extra meta data to generate related files like deployment descriptors and source code," said Rick Hightower, director of development at eBlox and author of the developerWorks Web site's "Enhance J2EE component reuse with XDoclets" tutorial.

This, said Hightower, can cut out quite a bit of redundant coding.

"Initially, with Enterprise JavaBeans, what you had was five to 10 files [for describing and deploying] one Enterprise JavaBean," he explained. "With XDoclet, you have one file, and from that one file you generate all the support files, including various design patterns like value objects, data transfer objects, etc., all from marking the meta data in the one source file and then running it through XDoclet."

Hightower, the author of "Java Tools for Extreme Programming," said an important part of succeeding with technology is to get machines to do more of the work. "If a computer can figure something out," he said, "then a human shouldn't have to."

Links:

Tutorial: "Enhance J2EE component reuse with XDoclets"
http://www-106.ibm.com/developerworks/edu/ws-dw-ws-j2x-i.html

developerWorks home
http://www-106.ibm.com/developerworks

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