GWT vs J2EE

[Scott Selikoff]

On a recent thread, ranchers discussed the merits of Flash vs GWT, implying that GWT could potentially kill Flash. Flash's primary strength is that is vector-based animations and layouts, which GWT cannot do, so to me they are competing in completely different areas. It would be like someone telling me they are replacing Notepad with Photoshop; sure you could do it by why would you?

I think the elephant in the room people aren't discussing is that GWT is poised to replace over a dozen J2EE-based tools. Sure, GWT can integrate with many J2EE components but in many cases it replaces them. The AppEngine takes this even further by essentially acting like the J2EE JVM, restricting what a user can and cannot do in Java and forcing them to use Google's storage methods.

So what do you guys think? Do you think GWT and the AppEngine will play nice with J2EE, or replace many of the common frameworks we use today?

[Gregg Bolinger]

I can't compile GWT with my 64bit Java on my Mac. So at least until that is fixed, no, GWT won't replace anything.

[Hussein Baghdadi]

I developed a GWT for a client in the past and it was the only time for me.
GWT programming model (building the interface in code) was a killer for me, I have the same experience with Apache Wicket.
Well, sorry I hijacked the thread

[Bear Bibeault]

I detest building UI in code. GWT isn't going to replace anything for me.

[Scott Selikoff]

Bear Bibeault wrote:I detest building UI in code. GWT isn't going to replace anything for me.

I'm sure GUI editor plug-ins are on the TODO list for someone at Google.

[Bear Bibeault]

I also detest anything that tries (and always fails) to generate code that's better than I can create by hand.

It doesn't matter what they do at Google, GWT is a non-starter for me.

[Bear Bibeault]

P.S. You might think that I hate GWT from these posts. But I don't. I think it's a great solution for shops that have lots of Java and Swing experience and want to move onto the web without any web-savvy resources. But the web-savvy don't need the hassle and limitations it imposes.

[salvin francis]

well, it seems you "detest" a lot

Bear Bibeault wrote:to generate code that's better than I can create by hand

it is difficult to digest that, but I feel that a similar feeling was amongst guys who knew Assembly and C language came along...
sometimes its better to leave pop,push,jmp,jne and switch to for, while, do-while (pardon my analogy here)

@ UI in code: there lies no ui that hath not buildth in codeth...
All ui is build in code, be it HTML or swing, but usually you use an editor that does it for you.

I was a part of that flash-gwt thread, and I honestly feel that gwt wont kill flash. they are each solving a different problem, though at times their differences do blur...

I am working on a large scale project that has spring,hibernate at the back-end with GWT at the front end.
GWT ui code is totally isolated from our business logic. I don't see anything "killing" anything here.

[Hussein Baghdadi]

Salvin,
Many people (including me) build HTML pages by hand, I don't use tools like DreamWeaver.
I don't use any builder to design/generate my interface, not in HTML neither in Swing.
And yes you can isolate GWT UI code from the business logic but you build your interface in code (layout managers).
I would like to use a declarative approach to build the interface (Apache Tapestry).
Any way, I hope GWT 2 offers what it says "Declarative Interface Design"