Sun Java Studio Creator Training at San Francisco

Today I visited (along with my colleagues Chau Nguyen & Jim Inscore) the Sun Java Studio Creator 3-day training site at San Francisco. It was fun to meet the instructors Gail and Paul Anderson and the attendees. There were lots of questions, which we tried to reply as much as possible

Some of the questions I remember are

• Q: When can we expect Creator pack for Netbeans 5.5
• A: Fall or early winter 2006
• Q: Will there be a Desktop Application development project for Creator
• A: Even though there were plans, now Creator being integrated into Netbeans, Creator user will automatically get access to Desktop GUI builder. This GUI builder lacks features like data binding and application model. However, such features are planned for future release. 
• Q: One of the missing feature in Creator is Theme editor. Is there a plan for one?
• A: Yes, a plan has been proposed. The implementation depends on management and marketing guidelines.
• Q: While working with tons of pages, it is difficult to modify the look and feel because modifying the base template does not modifies the pages created from it. Is there a plan for tile integration or feature like master pages.
• A: This feature is also in the future plan list.
• Q: Will there be a support for floating windows. Creator 1 had this but removed in Creator 2.
• A: This feature was removed when Creator 2 used Window manager from Netbeans 4.1. Also Creator 1 Window manager had a bug that caused the floated window to disappear or hide behind the main window. Interestingly Netbeans is introducing the floating window.
• Q: Will there be a database visual design tool for Creator like M$ Access
• A: Creator audience are expected to be day to day Rapid Application developers in a corporate IT environment. Where as database design tools are meant to be used by enterprise developers. Given that in mind this tool was not implemented in Creator. However, Creator pack on Netbeans 5.5 will inherit several advance database features from Netbeans.
• Q: When I drag and drop a JDBC table component I want it to create a detail form, with out a need for user to assemble the form, just like it is done in tools like PowerBuilder. Is this possible
• A: Yes, there is a plan. In fact the proposal is to provide a dialog to the user that would give option to either create a detail view form or normal table component.
• Q: In tools like Delphi, when I click a select a component and then press F1 key, a dialog pops up to provide details about the component API, whether Creator can provide such feature.
• A: Interesting feature. We could provide one like that. Currently the possibilities are to use the online help corresponding to component from dynamic help or to use the JavaDoc from the source editor.

One of the attendee asked me about how to provide a TextField in which user can type a SQL query and up on submission should dynamically create a table component based on the query output. This is an interesting exercise. I tried to provide an solution from top of my head. Probably, I'll create a blog on this exercise.

Another customer pointed out a bug in Netbeans 4.1 (up on which Creator was built). As per the bug Ctrl+Alt+F brings up a progress dialog for "Fix import", but fails to fix the imports. Happens intermittently.

Over all the visit was very pleasant. I was surprised to hear that an attendee has come all the way from Phoenix. According to weather.com the temperature at Phoenix is around 110 F. Hope he has enjoyed the cool San Francisco weather.

Posted at 11:44PM Jun 22, 2006  |  Permanent link to this entry