The basic infrastructure
Before I know it I’m almost 3 months further and no posts yet…. When I started developing an application with GWT I soon found out I needed a basic infrastructure to speed up the development.
Part of the infrastructure is the Java servlet engine and how it works. A good start is the Java servlet specification: servlet-2_4-fr-spec.pdf, which you can download here from the sun site. This describes all standard functionality, which you get from a servlet engine, like Tomcat.
I started with a basic look and feel similar to Google Mail and Google Calendar or also available in the GWT Kitchen Sink example. The features I want are the list on the left side, the main panels, a settings panel and a feedback panel at the top which is shown when errors occur or after some user action. To be able to develop my own application faster I first decided to build a basic framework that handles all these panels and to build my application up on this framework. That way I don’t have to worry about basic features and can focus on the features I want in my application. I plan to release the framework when its finished. I have no planning but I don’t hope it will take another 3 months…