GWT 2.4.0 Release

Looks like it is time to upgrade GWT again. Version 2.4 of GWT is now available. See the release notes below:

Google Web Toolkit Release Notes:

'via Blog this'

GAE/GWT Book: Google App Engine Java and GWT Application Development

Daniel Guermeur asked me to share some information on this new GAE/GWT book.

As you might know from my GWT blog post about hosting GWT apps you can deploy your app to a simple servlet container like Tomcat.  Recently Google App Engine started supporting GWT applications for deployment, so this gives you the ability to use Google's massive infrastructure to deploy your GWT application.  There are some things that you will need to do differently however when deploying to GAE vs a standard servlet container, and the book Google App Engine Java and GWT Application Development is there to help you though the process of building your GWT application and deploying it to Google App Engine.  Through the different chapters of the book you will follow the authors as they build and deploy their GWT app Connectr.

To get a feel for what to expect with this book you can download Chapter 9 - Robustness and Scalability: Transactions, Memcache,and Datastore Design - for free!


Along with the free chapter 9 content you also will find:

• An overview of what the book covers
• A listing of the chapters found in the book with information on what topics will be covered
• A section introducing the two authors Daniel Guermeur and Amy Unru. 

You can also find a nice description of the book and its chapters here if you prefer not to download the PDF file of chapter 9.


The book is now available for order now from Amazon.com


Amazon Reviews for this book
Use the Connectr App found in the book.

If you already have this book you can also download the code from Packt.  Enter in your email address and you will receive a link to download link for the Connectr App source as found in the book.  For those of you who are interested Connectr source code is licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0.

The Authors blog can be found here where you will find code updates and errata when they become available. 

GWT browser plugin for Chrome under Mac and Linux now available

Chrome Developer plugins are now available on Linux and Mac.  See this post for more information on this new feature.

Free online GWT/GAE Book

If you are looking for a great source on developing with the Google Web Toolkit and Google App Engine check out this free online book. Link is below.

gwt-gae-book - Project Hosting on Google Code

GWT 2.1 Released, download now

See what is new with Version 2.1 of GWT.
Download GWT 2.1.
You can also download the latest version of GWT using the download links on the right hand of this page ->

Latest Trunk Build of GWT Available Now

Often I find that waiting for the next build of GWT just takes too long.  Well this is not really true, builds of GWT come out as quickly as the GWT team can produce them.

So what if you are looking for the latest trunk build of GWT?  You can always build your own copy by checking out the source, checking out the tools, installing Apache Ant and then compiling the GWT code yourself as found here.  One thing about compiling it yourself is that it takes a while to complete, like upwards of an hour.

A few weeks ago I had a chance to start using Hudson to automatically build some of my GWT projects, then the though occurred to me that I could also use Hudson to build the latest trunk of GWT when there there is a source code change and then post the resulting output file.

As of today I am happy to share that you can download the latest GWT Trunk from my google code project. The project name is horrible as it does not have anything to do with GWT, but if you are looking for the latest GWT trunk build I am sure you can look past the poor project name.
If you would like to watch for the latest build via RSS you can use this feed here to watch for the latest trunk build.

Remember trunk builds of GWT are probably not something you want to move into a production environment, but sometimes you need the latest GWT build.

Quick Links:
My Google code project download section (get GWT trunk builds here).
RSS feed of the latest GWT trunk builds.

Instantiations purchased by Google

According to the Instantiations web site they have been purchased by Google.  Here is a little info from their site:

We’re excited to announce that Instantiations is now part of Google!
Yes it’s true. Instantiations’ award-winning Java and Ajax development tools and our incredible Eclipse team have been acquired by Google. We are all very excited about taking our technology and team to the next level - and there is no bigger step up than Google!........

They also said that you should watch the official GWT blog for more information and I assume an official announcement from Google.
Google Web Toolkit Blog

New GWT 2 Development book: Essential GWT

I recently had the opportunity to be one of the technical editors for the book Essential GWT: Building for the Web with Google Web Tookit 2.

Some of the topics in the book are:


Getting started 

• Some background on GWT, what it is, etc.
• Understanding the tools you will need while developing with GWT such as Eclipse
• Client side code vs server side code
• OOPHM, compiler options, GWT application layout.

 Client Side Coding

• User interface programming
• Form designing using HTML, XML, UiBinder.
• Other GWT packages such as ExtGWT

Server Communications

• Remote Procedure Calls 
• Communicating with other serivces like XML and JSON
• Sending and receiving files

Building rich internet applications

• Integrating JavaScript and calling it from GWT
• Exception handling
• Using other services and APIs such as Google search, Yahoo search
• Internationalization (i18n) and Localization (i10n)
• Testing your GWT app with Junit and test cases

I really enjoyed being a technical editor for this book.  The author Federico Kereki did a great job covering just about every topic you would need to create a powerful GWT application.

There were a couple of topics that were not covered in much detail, but I find they are things that I use in my daily GWT development:

1. Building ANT tasks that can automate your build process.  I have built scripts that compile server side code, gwt code and deploy to my Tomcat server of choice.  

2. Using GWT app engine with your GWT application.  You can either pay to have Tomcat hosting on the internet or you can use GWT app engine to host your GWT project for free.

I highly recommend this book, you can pickup a copy from Amazon:

Upgrading GWT code from version 1.7 to version 2.0

I have already starting converting several of my GWT apps from older version of GWT to version 2.0.  According to this link the steps are as follows.

There are 3 tasks involved when upgrading a GWT 1.7 project to a GWT 2.0 project:

• Download GWT 2.0 and update your launch configurations
• HostedMode has been replaced by DevMode, so you will need to update your Eclipse project settings accordingly.
• Tests now run in HtmlUnit by default. You will need to modify some of your tests to work with HtmlUnit.
  

So far I have not run into any issues with upgrading.  As of this post I have not seen any mention of a GWT 2.0 Incubator file, but my apps seem happy with the older version gwt-incubator-july-14-2009.jar.  I have seen several warnings however while compiling with this version such as:



         [WARN] Line 102: Referencing deprecated class 'com.google.gwt.widgetideas.table.client.overrides.HTMLTable'
         [WARN] Line 103: Referencing deprecated class 'com.google.gwt.widgetideas.table.client.overrides.Grid'
         [WARN] Line 104: Referencing deprecated class 'com.google.gwt.widgetideas.table.client.overrides.Grid'
         [WARN] Line 104: Referencing deprecated class 'com.google.gwt.widgetideas.table.client.overrides.HTMLTable'

GWT 2.0.0 is here. Get your copy today!

You can now download and start using GWT version 2.0.  If you are using Eclipse the links are below, and of course if you are already using Eclipse then you should be able to update to the latest plugin and GWT version automatically.

Eclipse 3.5 (Galileo)
http://dl.google.com/eclipse/plugin/3.5
Eclipse 3.4 (Ganymede)
http://dl.google.com/eclipse/plugin/3.4
Eclipse 3.3 (Europa)
http://dl.google.com/eclipse/plugin/3.3

If you would like to download the latest version of GWT without using Eclipse you can find the download here.


Some of the new changes:
Speed Tracer
Speed Tracer is a Chrome Extension that allows you to pinpoint performance problems in your web applications.
Downloading & getting started with Speed Tracer for Google Chrome


Speed tracer tutorial video


What's New in GWT 2.0?


New Features

• Development Mode
• Speed Tracer
• Developer Guided Code Splitting
• Compiler Optimizations
• Draft Compile
• Declarative User Interfaces
• Layout Panels
• Bundled Resources via ClientBundle
• HtmlUnit for Testing

Video of changes in GWT Version 2.0:



Google Web Toolkit Gallery


Google Web Toolkit Showcase of Features

Announcing GWT 2.0 Milestone 1

If you are like me I am sure you have been patiently waiting for the release of GWT 2.0.  If you are ready to start some early testing of GWT 2.0 you can download a copy of the Milestone 1 release here.  It is interesting to note that you no longer need to download the appropriate version for you development environment.  Now you simply download this single version and then GWT will download the appropriate plugins for your browser. There are lots of changes in this Milestone 1 release so your best bet is to take a look at the release notes and also the GWT 2.0 Milestone 1 announcement  in the GWT group here.
Be on the lookout for bugs and you probably don't want to attempt to use this version in your GWT production environment at this time.

GWT Google Plugin for Eclipse 1.1.0

For those of you using the GWT Eclipse plugin there is a new version. Of course if you installed in Eclipse and have automatic updates enabled then you probably know about this update already.

Here are some of the main features of this release:

- Support for Eclipse 3.5 (Galileo)

- GWT RPC interface validation with quick fixes

- App Engine DataNucleus enhancer console no longer steals focus on save

The GWT group thread on this new version is here.

Depending on your version of Eclipse you have different URLs for installation:

- Eclipse 3.5 (Galileo) - http://dl.google.com/eclipse/plugin/3.5

- Eclipse 3.4 (Ganymede) - http://dl.google.com/eclipse/plugin/3.4

- Eclipse 3.3 (Europa) - http://dl.google.com/eclipse/plugin/3.3

GWT Tetris - Great Puzzle Game from the 80s

I am sure there are some of you out there that have never heard of the puzzle game Tetris. Seems like the 1980s was just a few years ago, ah how time flys. I first played the game Tetris on my Tandy Color Computer 3, and played and played. I absolutly loved the game! Funny, I still love the Color Computer too. Here is a screen shot of Tetris on the Color Computer:

Some time ago I tought it would be a fun little project to take the game Tetris and write a GWT version of it. Well now someone has already done it. A few days ago on the Google Web Toolkit Group I noticed a post about Tetris. I had to give it a try, and I was quite impressed with the result:

I had a chance to talk to the author Janusz Prokulewicz and asked him a few questions about the development of this game.

Some time ago Janusz created a Java version of his Tetris game. Having created the same game as a linux shell application over 4 years ago he was able to get his Java version working in three days. So the real question, how hard was it to convert to GWT and how long did it take? To quote Janusz: "It took me 2 and a half days (or rather nights) to do it".

So we have an existing Java application that Janusz was able to convert it to GWT in two nights. The game can now be played in any modern browser with no special plug-ins and no goofy browser quirks to worry about. Write it once in GWT and compile and you are ready to go.

Unfortunately at this time he does not have a web site that contains his other work, maybe in the future he can set something up.

He used GWT version 1.6.4 with no additional libraries.

The game is deployed with a PHP backend using JSON to get/send data to the server.

Janusz's web site is here.

Update June-8-2009: Janusz now has a blog setup. You can see his site here.

Play GWT Tetris now!

GWT support in Google Apps Engine AND GWT 1.6

Big news today for GWT!

First GWT 1.6 is available for download. Please see the official blog entry from Google here.

Second big annoucement for GWT is that the Google Apps Engine now supports Java. One thing to be aware of is that google has said that they are only allowing the first 10,000 developers. Better sign up fast. Here is the link to signup.

The also ask that you provide feedback, here is that link.

To find out more please see the official blog post from Google here on Google App Engine supporting Java.

For those of you using Eclipse for Java development (and I highly recommend you use it) there is now a GWT/App engine plugin for Eclipse.
For more information on the plugin see this Blog post.

The quick start guide to install the GWT/Google App Engine Eclipse plugin is here.

If you are already an eclipse user and know how to install plugins here are the shortcuts you need:

Eclipse 3.3 (Europa)

http://dl.google.com/eclipse/plugin/3.3

Eclipse 3.4 (Ganymede)

http://dl.google.com/eclipse/plugin/3.4

GWT 1.6 Milestone 1 available for download

This is the latest GWT release, it is a milestone release so be sure to only use it for testing.

• Download and start playing with this new version.
• Documentation for release 1.6 Milestone 1.
• Changes in this release.

If you are like me and use Eclipse to develope your GWT application there is a nice change that is part of this release. You no longer need to run these commands to create a new GWT Eclipse project:

C:\Program Files\gwt-windows-1.5.3>applicationCreator.cmd -eclipse MyGWTProject -out c:\MyGWTProject com.mynumnum.client.MyClass
Created directory c:\MyGWTProject\src
Created directory c:\MyGWTProject\src\com\mynumnum
Created directory c:\MyGWTProject\src\com\mynumnum\client
Created directory c:\MyGWTProject\src\com\mynumnum\public
Created file c:\MyGWTProject\src\com\mynumnum\MyClass.gwt.xml
Created file c:\MyGWTProject\src\com\mynumnum\public\MyClass.html
Created file c:\MyGWTProject\src\com\mynumnum\public\MyClass.css
Created file c:\MyGWTProject\src\com\mynumnum\client\MyClass.java
Created file c:\MyGWTProject\MyClass.launchCreated file c:\MyGWTProject\MyClass-shell.cmd
Created file c:\MyGWTProject\MyClass-compile.cmd

C:\Program Files\gwt-windows-1.5.3>projectCreator.cmd -eclipse MyGWTProject -out c:\MyGWTProject

Created directory c:\MyGWTProject\test
Created file c:\MyGWTProject\.project
Created file c:\MyGWTProject\.classpath

Now all you need to do is run the command webAppCreator:

C:\Program Files\gwt-windows-1.6.0>webAppCreator.cmd -out c:\MyGWT16Project com.
mynumnum.MyClass
Created directory c:\MyGWT16Project\src
Created directory c:\MyGWT16Project\war
Created directory c:\MyGWT16Project\war\WEB-INFCreated directory c:\MyGWT16Project\src\com\mynumnum
Created directory c:\MyGWT16Project\src\com\mynumnum\client
Created directory c:\MyGWT16Project\src\com\mynumnum\server
Created file c:\MyGWT16Project\src\com\mynumnum\MyClass.gwt.xml
Created file c:\MyGWT16Project\war\MyClass.html
Created file c:\MyGWT16Project\war\MyClass.cssCreated file c:\MyGWT16Project\war\WEB-INF\web.xml
Created file c:\MyGWT16Project\src\com\mynumnum\client\MyClass.java
Created file c:\MyGWT16Project\src\com\mynumnum\client\EchoService.java
Created file c:\MyGWT16Project\src\com\mynumnum\client\EchoServiceAsync.java
Created file c:\MyGWT16Project\src\com\mynumnum\server\EchoServiceImpl.java
Created file c:\MyGWT16Project\build.xml
Created file c:\MyGWT16Project\.projectCreated file c:\MyGWT16Project\.classpath
Created file c:\MyGWT16Project\MyClass.launch

Your new GWT 1.6 Project will be ready for import into Eclipse. Also you will notice that a simple client and server class is created in the example that demonstrates how to send and receive RPC requests.

Errors when launching your Eclipse GWT project in the GWT shell

You must create a lib folder in your 'project folder'/war/WEB-INF folder and copy gwt-servlet.jar into that folder.
After this is done you should be able to launch your new Project without this nasty error message:

2009-02-13 12:22:51.760::INFO:  Logging to STDERR via org.mortbay.log.StdErrLog
2009-02-13 12:22:51.901::INFO:  jetty-6.1.x
2009-02-13 12:22:52.229::WARN:  failed echoServlet
java.lang.NoClassDefFoundError: com/google/gwt/user/client/rpc/RemoteService
at java.lang.ClassLoader.defineClass1(Native Method)
at java.lang.ClassLoader.defineClass(Unknown Source)