General Frequently Asked Questions about SweetDEV RIA

  1. What are the requirements in order to use SweetDEV RIA ?
  2. How to start developing with SweetDEV RIA ?
  3. How to select the tld to use?
  4. Why some JavaScript objects are not described in the JsDoc?
  5. Why is there a tag called newwindow ?
  6. How to use the SweetDEV RIA components with a custom Ajax framework ?
  7. How to handle a server down error ?
  8. How to trigger a custom behavior on Ajax requesting?
  9. What can be exported from the grid ?
What are the requirements in order to use SweetDEV RIA ?
Here are some requirements and support offered by SweetDEV RIA :

  • SweetDEV RIA is a framework built and runnable from a JDK 1.4 and above.
  • The browsers supported are Firefox 1.5+, Internet Explorer 6+.
  • The framework can be run on any application server.
  • It fully compatible with WebApp version 2.3 and 2.4.
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How to start developing with SweetDEV RIA ?
The mandatory to information start a project with SweetDEV RIA are given in the Getting Started section.



An other way to start with SweetDEV RIA is by following theses 2 simple steps :

  • Download the latest application sweetdev-ria-blank-XXX.war from sourceforge here, and copy the libs and web.xml configuration to your application, or simply start a new application from this one, depends of your needs.
  • Download the latest application sweetdev-ria-gettingStarted-XXX.war from sourceforge or have a look to the ShowCase. The pages display the components in different situation and help you to start with.
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How to select the tld to use?
SweetDEV RIA provides 2 tlds in the jar, to respond to two kinds of configuration :
  • sweetdev-ria.tld
  • sweetdev-ria-el.tld


The EL (expression language) is a major feature of the JSP. They permit to easily target some elements in request, session, or application scope. We think most of the developers really enjoy the EL and use it as much as possible (thats our case).



The main problem is that this EL evaluation depends on the Servlet/JSP version you set up in your web application.

In Servlet 2.4/JSP 2.0, the EL evaluation is automatically processed during the JSP evaluation. In this case, SweetDEV RIA gets discharged the duties of evaluating the EL, as processed by the JSP container. Each attribute are set and retrieved by the tag class as objects.

In Servlet 2.3/JSP 1.2, the EL are NOT pre evaluated, and we have to do this task by ourselves. This is the reason why the special tld only work with Strings in tags attributes, which are then evaluated into some specific JSP1.2 tag class.





To handle these two cases, we decided to provide 2 tlds : one for JSP2.0 (the standard one working with the most recent versions, sweetdev-ria.tld) and one for JSP1.2 (sweetdev-ria-el.tld). Choose and work with the one corresponding to your web application version, and just forget about the other one.
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Why some JavaScript objects are not described in the JsDoc?
Due to our JsDoc generation, the static class (DomHelper for example) are not generated in their own category, but in the GLOBALS one.

Have a look to this section to have an overview of all the classes not listed on the left side.
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Why is there a tag called newwindow ?
There were historically 2 window components :

  • ria:window : it was an historical component, used to display the ex-datagrid preferences. It has been deleted since the version 2.2 and replaced with the following one :
  • ria:newwindow : created to easily develop new functionalities on a window and implement a docking layout component.

    Its JavaScript API permits to open/close easily and much more !.
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How to use the SweetDEV RIA components with a custom Ajax framework ?
SweetDEV RIA components need to be initialized on page load.

This cannot be done by an Ajax call. This is the reason why you must add this piece of code in your javascript callback function to initialize properly the components : 
	SweetDevRia.init ();
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How to handle a server down error ?
If an Ajax call is triggered by the client, but without getting any contact with the server (probably because of a server crash), this error can be handled in your client and processed the way you want it to.

Override the JavaScript public function 
/**
 * Function called if the server cannot be reached
 * @param {Exception} ex the JavaScript native exception caught (Firefox)
 * @param {errorCode} errorCode the error code (Internet Explorer)
 * @see http://groups.google.com/group/prototype-core/msg/3e0fe68dd1da9c1e
 */
SweetDevRia.Ajax.prototype.onServerUnreachable = function(ex, errorCode){};
By default, we log this exception with our client logger, as an ERROR one.
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How to trigger a custom behavior on Ajax requesting?
An simple API composed of 2 functions gives you the possibility to trigger some actions on ajax calls.

Simply override, the JavaScript function SweetDevRia.Ajax.onSendRequest and SweetDevRia.Ajax.onReceiveResponse to define your behavior. Does nothing by default.



Note that this behavior is independent from the Ajax instance used, as the Ajax objects are pooled.
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What can be exported from the grid ?
The grid can export its data in two ways : WYSIWYG (the current user view) and MODEL (the table data as they were before the user manipulation).

In both cases, the Details wont be exported. This feature is only designed to give some precisions to the user, not to be exported in an excel file.
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