The Angular Mini-Book is a
guide to getting started with Angular. You'll learn how to develop a bare-bones application, test it, and
deploy it. Then you'll move on to adding Bootstrap, Angular Material, continuous integration, and authentication.
Spring Boot is a popular framework for building REST APIs. You'll learn how to integrate Angular with Spring Boot and use security best practices like HTTPS and a content security policy.
For book updates, follow @angular_book on Twitter.
The JHipster Mini-Book is a
guide to getting started with hip technologies today: Angular, Bootstrap, and Spring
Boot. All of these frameworks are wrapped up in an easy-to-use project called JHipster.
This book shows you how to build an app with JHipster, and guides you through the plethora of tools, techniques and options you can use. Furthermore, it explains the UI and API building blocks so you understand the underpinnings of your great application.
For book updates, follow @jhipster-book on Twitter.
From the Tapestry User Mailing List, I discovered a cool example of integrating an Ajax component in Tapestry. The code needed to add it looks nice and easy too. Hopefully this will set the groundwork for a plethora of Tapestry/Ajax components.
Thanks to a post to the Struts Menu Mailing List, I discovered a nice blog about JavaScript and DHTML. Not only does it seem to have lots of good tips and tricks, but its author also has a couple of cool menu examples:
Nice work Todd!
One of the annoying things about JSPs is all of the dynamic (non-rendered) parts of the page still produce line breaks. This means that if you do a view-source, you'll likely see large blocks of whitespace.
The good news is you can get rid of this whitespace if you're using Tomcat 5.5.x. Just locate the "jsp" servlet in $CATALINA_HOME/conf/web.xml and add the following <init-param>:
<init-param>
<param-name>trimSpaces</param-name>
<param-value>true</param-value>
</init-param>
I tested it and it works great. This begs the question - why isn't this on by default? Source: Struts Mailing List.
Update: JSP 2.1 adds the ability to trim whitespaces.
I've talked to a couple of Java developers lately that asked me "Sooo, when are you going to be done with Spring Live?" I was quite surprised to hear this because I finished it in October. I guess folks just aren't used to the constantly updated thing. Or maybe SourceBeat needs to do better marketing?
Regardless, Spring Live has been a blast to write. I was definitely hesitant when I signed up to write it b/c I didn't know much about Spring. But a year later, it seems to be getting good reviews and holding it's own when compared with the other Spring books. I'm also starting to see some traction from the book itself - not only in book sales, but also in training and invitations to speak at conferences.
If you're looking for Spring training, don't hesitate to contact me or SourceBeat directly. Also, the Spring Developers offer Spring training as does Rick Hightower.
From the Struts User Mailing List, I spotted a good explanation of how IE handles PDFs. It's quite messed up, so I thought I'd post it for your amusement.
If
your application returns data that is to be handled with an ActiveX
control (ie Adobe Acrobat Reader) the browser sends additional
requests to the server. In IE 4.x and 5 it actually sends three
requests. For IE 5.5+ it sends two.
Assuming that your using IE 5.5+, the first request is the original
request (duh), but then IE sends a second request to get the
content-type. Who knows why they can't figure this out on the first
request 
This second request has it's userAgent header set to
"contype". You can solve this problem and increase the performance of
your application by writing a Servlet filter that sits in front of
whatever Actions you have setup to serve PDF content. Have this
filter look at the userAgent header of each request. If it's set to
"contype" just send an an empty response back to the client with the
content type set to "application/pdf". Simple as that.
More info on this "feature" is on Microsoft's site.
Want to create squares with rounded corners - and only use CSS? If so, you might want to checkout the CSS Rounded Box Generator. Source: CSS Beauty.
Sorry David, but I have to call you out on this one. Yesterday, you wrote a long post about how you won't use Tapestry b/c you have bills to pay.
Do I use Tapestry? Heck no. I have a mortgage to pay. Besides, I'm so comfortable with JSF that I don't know if it'd be worth the investment for me to switch to Tapestry. Also, JSF already enjoys more industry support and that gap will widen considerably over the next couple years as Tapestry maintains a small but rabid group of followers in a niche market, whereas JSF will dethrone Struts as the reigning king of Java-based WAFs. JSF will eventually have support for HTML views and custom components devoid of Java code, in addition to many other cool features such as built-in AJAX support and client-side validation.
Today we find that you're writing a book on Rails. So rather than spending the time to learn Tapestry b/c it doesn't pay the bills - you're going to learn Rails? What makes you think it will pay the bills better than Tapestry? Is Shale still the next big thing for you - or do you just like writing books?
I don't know where I learned about these, but they're pretty good.
So what's the best Java-based framework available today? It's a very close call, IMO, but I'd have to give the nod to Tapestry at the moment. I really like Tapestry's pure separation of HTML and components and the ability to create custom components without any Java code. That gives it an edge on JSF, which, like Tapestry is one of what I refer to as 3rd generation WAFs, that support components and a server-side event model.
He goes on to say that he'll likely continue to use JSF (with Shale) because it pays the bills and will dethrone Struts as the most popular - which will obviously lead to more gigs. I especially like this part of his post:
After I get client-side validation and file uploads added to Shale I want to turn my attention to Tiles integration, AJAX support and exploring Tapestry-like views that strictly separate HTML and component definitions. For me, those are the most exciting areas of Shale.
I agree that JSF definitely needs Tapestry-like HTML Templates. Shale definitely sounds cool, but I find it funny that it takes yet another framework to make JSF usable. Hopefully Shale will prove a lot of ideas worthwhile and end up as features in JSF 2.0.
Click on any of the images below to see a bunch of pictures I took at the Microsoft Junket this week.
It's good to be home. Abbie, Jack and I had a good time watching DU beat CC tonight. Go DU!