From the springframework-devel mailing list:
I've revived my Quartz support classes for Spring today. They emerged from a job scheduling consulting
project I did in autumn 2003. We have concrete needs for this now at werk3AT, thus the revival: It's about
quite simple cron-style scheduling of application jobs.
I've revived my Quartz support classes for Spring today. They emerged from a job scheduling consulting
project I did in autumn 2003. We have concrete needs for this now at werk3AT, thus the revival: It's about
quite simple cron-style scheduling of application jobs.
The basic idea is to set up a Quartz Scheduler via a SchedulerFactoryBean, also allowing to register
scheduled jobs there via a <list> of <refs> to ScheduledJobDefinition beans. A ScheduledJobDefinition
is just a simple combination of a Quartz JobDetail and a Quartz Trigger.
ScheduledJobDefinition bean implementations include:
- DefaultScheduledJobDefinition, allowing to use any implementation of Quartz' Job interface with a
declaratively configured job data map and cron trigger
- MethodInvokingJobDefinition, allowing to specify a method of a Spring-managed bean to execute as job
(completely declarative, without the need for implementing a custom Job object), with a cron trigger.
Both job definition beans can link in a separate Quartz Trigger instance instead of a cron expression;
DefaultScheduledJobDefinition can also link in a separate Quartz JobDetail instance instead of a job class.
Very nice!
Overheard this evening on Gavin's site:
My performance tests are showing a really big difference in performance, just from removing the finalizer. For one problematic test, I actually halved the overhead of Hibernate!
I can barely believe this result, but I've been successfully reproducing it for the last two hours.
Time to ditch those finalizers eh?
After reading this thread comparing JUnit in Action to Pragmatic Unit Testing, I broke down and bought both the CVS and Unit testing books. They're short and sound sweet - just how I like 'em. I'm hoping I can knock each one out in a few days.
I definitely need to learn more about using (when/how) Mock Objects for unit testing - my fingers are crossed that this book has the answers I'm looking for.
As I'm developing this morning and pulling a drop-down list from the database, it hit me - I'm not internationalizing these drop-down values. Sure, putting them in the database makes it easier for admins to edit the values, but if a user visits the site with a Spanish locale, they're going to get English drop-downs. So how do I fix this?
Is the best solution to put the drop-down choices in Struts' ApplicationResources.properties file so that I can render the values with <bean:message/> or <fmt:message/>? How do you do it in your webapps?
In some cases, I guess it doesn't matter as the values need to be in English. Take for instance, AppFuse's edit user screen (user/pass: mraible/tomcat). The list of roles comes from the database and should always be in English because the form-based authentication depends on having an English role_name value in the user_role.role_name column - since this is the value coded in web.xml.
Mike Lawrence (the guy who wrote the AppFuse on Orion tutorial), sent me an e-mail yesterday asking about AppFuse 1.3 (the latest release) vs. 1.4 (still in CVS).
Spring
This looks like a pretty new framework. I wonder how stable it is?
How far along are you with 1.4? You've made more changes to 1.3 to move
to 1.4 than I've made to 1.3. So, I'd be better off just taking your 1.4
base and integrating my changes.
Did you eliminate struts as the MVC framework?
Doesn't this invalidate your awesome AppFuse tutorials?
I'd really like to stay in sync with your new release, however, I've got
major production deadlines to meet. It would stink if I automated a
bunch of stuff for 1.3 that you couldn't use in 1.4. Yet, if I move to
1.4, will I be facing stability issues and no tutorial docs?
I figured it'd be better if I answer his questions here, as other folks might be wondering the same thing.
Spring - how stable is it?
As with most open source projects, the version number doesn't always indicate the stability of a product. Roller hasn't reached 1.0, but I would venture to say it's a mature and stable product. If you asked this question on the Spring mailing list, you'd likely received a lot of responses saying that it's very stable and used in many production systems. IMO, it's a very stable framework and likely to be the next Struts (in terms of popularity). I don't know that it's MVC framework will be that popular, but it's persistence support classes, declarative transactions and AOP framework are pretty slick. The fact that it integrates smoothly with all leading MVC frameworks is a nice touch too.
I think the best answer is - you need to work with Spring and then decide for yourself. I love writing one-line DAO methods for Hibernate...
How far along are you with 1.4?
If you're already started an application with AppFuse version x, then you should stick with AppFuse version x until your project is finished. It's often a real pain to upgrade an existing app to use the latest stuff, and probably unlikely you'll gain that much value. However, if you're not under a tight deadline - and you really need something in a more recent release - it makes sense to upgrade. The tutorial I wrote on upgrading a 1.3 app to 1.4 is probably a one-time thing. I don't plan to do an upgrade document between all releases.
That being said, if you have enchancements for AppFuse and want me to roll them into the main code base, the best way is to create patches for the CVS version and then it'll be easier for me to figure out what you changed.
Did you eliminate struts as the MVC framework?
Definitely not - Struts will remain as the standard MVC framework because it is the most popular and most AppFuse users will likely use it. When I add MVC alternatives, they will be packaged similar to the iBATIS option - so you'll have to install them. Most MVC options will likely rip out Struts and replace it with their own stuff.
Doesn't this invalidate your awesome AppFuse tutorials?
The tutorials will be updated to support the latest release. I hope to have some time in early March to update these. As soon as I do, I'll release 1.4.
I'd really like to stay in sync with your new release, however, I've got
major production deadlines to meet. It would stink if I automated a
bunch of stuff for 1.3 that you couldn't use in 1.4. Yet, if I move to
1.4, will I be facing stability issues and no tutorial docs?
Staying in synch with AppFuse as I push out new releases is probably a waste of your time. I did it with Struts Resume for a long time, and it's a lot of work trying to keep up. I firmly believe that each release of AppFuse has been a solid one - they just keep getting better. The only reason to upgrade is for new features and/or bug fixes. I believe that 1.4 will be just as stable as 1.3 and there will be tutorial docs when its released. As far as your automation stuff, the best way to get that added is send me patches against CVS.
BTW, Mike has integrated Middlegen into his AppFuse-based project. He's also working on generating stubs of a lot of the DAO/Manager/Action files - I believe that's his automation stuff. Thanks for giving back so much to AppFuse Mike - now if I only had more time to keep up with your enhancements. ;-)
