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Rapid Application Development with Mozillaby Nigel McFarlane Download Book (Respecting the intellectual property of others is utmost important to us, we make every effort to make sure we only link to legitimate sites, such as those sites owned by authors and publishers. If you have any questions about these links, please contact us.) link 1 About Book Book Description Mozilla (www.mozilla.org) is an Open Source toolset that programmers can use to rapidly develop user-oriented software applications without having to suffer restrictions of HTML-based Web development. It's an innovative interpretation of XML, JavaScript and component technologies, conveniently bundled together. Simply put, Mozilla is to Linux what Visual Basic is to Windows: an entry-level tool that can do simple jobs fast. This latest book in Bruce Perens' Open Source Series provides a clear, complete and easy-to-absorb introduction to Mozilla and its related technologies: XUL, XBL and XPCOM, and takes a competent programmer from zero to full understanding. Packed with screenshots, code fragments and shorter code listings, you'll learn a new, efficient development process and trend for UIs and how to create "thick client" UIs with Mozilla technology. Learn to translate basic HTML and programming skills into a new, simple system for software development and produce quick and portable user-oriented software systems. Note - there are one million users, thousands of mozilla.org contributors, and hundreds of Netscape engineers behind Mozilla. From the Back Cover A must-have read for anybody interested in learning to build sophisticated applications with the Mozilla application framework.âMitchell Baker, President, The Mozilla Foundation Mozilla has grown to become a powerful framework for building cutting-edge web applications. Rapid Application Development with Mozilla is an indispensable guide for developers of such applications.âBrendan Eich, Chief Architect, The Mozilla Foundation, and Creator of JavaScript Far more than just a web browser, Mozilla is the platform of choice for today's application and web developer. An innovative blend of XML vocabularies, easy-to-use scripting languages, and pre-existing software objects, Mozilla is a powerful, standards-compliant platform whose functionality guarantees rapid application development (RAD). In Rapid Application Development with Mozilla, web, XML, and Open Standards expert Nigel McFarlane explores Mozilla's revolutionary XML User interface Language (XUL) and its library of well over 1,000 pre-built objects. Using clear and concise instruction, McFarlane explains what companies such as AOL, IBM, Hewlett-Packard, and others already knowâthat Mozilla and XUL are the keys to quickly and easily creating cross-platform, web-enabled applications. Coverage includes:
An additional feature of Rapid Application Development with Mozilla is the NoteTaker Web browser add-onâa sample Mozilla application that is developed throughout the book. When installed in a browser it allows you to add notes to web pagesâeven pages on other people's web sites! It is a memory and commentary tool that enhances repeat visits to a given site. This simple application provides a real-world example of all technologies used in the book. If you're an application programmer or a web developer and you're looking for a productive, state-of-the-art, cross-platform programming tool, then Rapid Application Development with Mozilla is essential reading. About the Author NIGEL MCFARLANE is a science and technology writer, analyst, and programmer. He is the author of many articles on Web, XML, JavaScript, and other technologies, and his work has appeared in periodicals such as DevX, The Sydney Morning Herald, and Builder.com. Nigel is also the author of Instant JavaScript and Professional JavaScript. He lives in Melbourne, Australia. Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved. IntroductionWelcome to Software Development the Mozilla Way The Mozilla Platform is a large software development tool that is a modern blend of XML document processing, scripting languages, and software objects. It is used to create interactive, user-focused applications. This book is a conceptual overview, reference, and tutorial on the use of the platform for building such applications. The Mozilla Platform encourages a particular style of software development: rapid application development (RAD). RAD occurs when programmers base their applications-to-be on a powerful development tool that contains much pre-existing functionality. With such a tool, a great deal can be done very quickly. The Mozilla Platform is such a tool. One strategy for doing RAD is to make sophisticated HTML pages and display them in a Web browser. This book does not explain HTML, nor does it show how to create such pages. It has very little to do with HTML. Instead, it shows how to create applications that require no browser, and that might appear to be nothing like a Web browser. Such applications might be Web-enabled, benefiting from the advantages that Web browsers have, or they might have nothing to do with the Web at all. Because Mozilla is closely linked to the Web in people's minds, this last point cannot be emphasized enough. The Mozilla Platform is far more than a browser. Here are some statistics:
This extensive and tested set of features is a huge creative opportunity for any developer interested in building applications. These features also offer an opportunity for traditional Web developers to broaden their existing skills in a natural way. This book covers the Mozilla Platform up to version 1.4. Changes between minor versions (e.g., 1.3 and 1.4) are small enough that most of this book will be correct for some time. Useful KnowledgeSome experience is required when reading this book. Some familiarity with Web standards is assumed. This list of skills is more than enough preparation:
All the standards for these technologies, except SQL and JavaScript, are available at <www.w3.org>. To read this book with very little effort, add these skills: a little Dynamic HTML; a little Prolog; more experience with an object-brokering system like COM or CORBA; additional experience with another RAD tool like a 4GL or a GUI Designer; and more SQL experience. It is common for advanced Mozilla programmers to have a full copy of the Mozilla Platform source code (40 MB, approximately). This book sticks strictly to the application services provided by the platform. There is no need to get involved in the source code, unless that is your particular interest. The Structure of This BookChapter 1, Fundamental Concepts, is an overview of Mozilla. The remaining chapters mimic the structure of the Mozilla Platform. The early chapters are about the front part of Mozilla, comprising XML markup, which displays the elements of a graphical user interface. As the chapters proceed, the subject matter works its way to the back of Mozilla. The back consists of objects that silently connect to other computing infrastructure, like file systems, networks, and servers. To summarize:
Within this flow from front to back, each chapter follows a set structure:
Some of these structural elements are discussed in the following topics. The NPA DiagramThe core of the Mozilla Platform is implemented in the C and C++ programming languages, using many object classes. To understand how it all works, one could draw a huge diagram that shows all the object-oriented relationships explicit in those classes. Such a diagram would be quite detailed, and any high-level features of the platform might not be obvious. Although the diagram might be accurate, it would be a challenge to understand. The NPA diagram is a simplified view of Mozilla's insides. NPA stands for not perfectly accurate. It is a learning aid. No one is arguing that Mozilla is built exactly as the diagram shows; the diagram is just a handy thinking tool. There is no attempt to illustrate everything that Mozilla does. The NPA diagram appears prior to each chapter of this book. The subject matter of a given chapter is usually tied to a specific part or parts of the diagram. Style OptionsMozilla makes extensive use of cascading stylesheet styles. In addition to features described in the CSS2 standard, Mozilla has many specialist style extensions. An example of a Mozilla-specific style is vbox { -moz-box-orient: vertical; } Most chapters contain a short section that describes Mozilla-style extensions relevant to that chapter. The NoteTaker ToolNoteTaker is a small programming project that is a running example throughout this book. There isn't room for developing a full application, so the compromise is a small tool that is an add-on. NoteTaker is a Web browser enhancement that provides a way to attach reminder notes (Web notes) to displayed Web pages. The browser user can attach notes to the pages of a Web site, and when that Web site is visited at a later date, the note reappears. This is done without modifying the remote Web site at all. Notes can be created, edited, updated, and deleted. The browser window shown has a new toolbar, which is the NoteTaker toolbar. That toolbar includes a drop-down menu, among other things. The displayed HTML page includes a small pale rectangle--that is the Web note for the page's URL. That rectangle does not appear anywhere in the displayed test.html file. Also shown is the Edit dialog window, which is used to specify the content and arrangement of the current note. As an idea, it doesn't matter whether NoteTaker is pure genius or horribly clumsy. Its purpose is to be a working technology demonstrator. Each chapter enhances NoteTaker in a small way so that, by the end of this book, all Mozilla's technologies can be seen at work together. There is no generally agreed upon technical term for describing NoteTaker. The relationship between the tool and a browser is a little like the relationship between a Java applet and a Java application. It is an add-on that is more than a mere configuration option but less than a plugin. This example project is attached to a Web browser. Generally speaking, Mozilla applications should run in their own windows with no Web browser in sight. There is no implication that all Mozilla applications should be designed like NoteTaker--it is just that NoteTaker is too small ... Related Free eBooks
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