Java Needs a CRUD Framework
I've tried Ruby on Rails (RoR) and I think it is pretty cool. I don't want what I'm going to say next diminish it. With that said I'm trying to step back and understand why so many people are attacking Java. I get the strong verses dynamic typed language stuff so please don't send me any nasty emails about that aspect of things. Where I'm coming from is that RoR has simply hit a sweet spot. It is the right thing at the right time. It is great for CRUD operations on a database that is newly created. If you are not able to control the database schema or you need to do more then CRUD operations than the developer using the framework starts to lose all the whiz-bang benefits of it.
Including a keyword "scaffold" in a controller and having that automatically generate a framework is great. Entering another command and having that framework saved to disk and based on your controller and model allow a developer to customize the generated framework is a powerful feature as well. However, I find it hard to believe that the ability to do this means "Java is Dead." Give me a break and think about how big Java is right now and how much people are doing with it. Where are all the IDEs for RoR? Does ROR have the large number of libraries that Java has to address the number of issues that it does? I don't think so and I think it will take a long time for Ruby to catch up on those fronts. Much longer then it would for the Java community to create its own CRUD framework or have an IDE come along with a wizard of some sort to accomplish such things.
What prompts me to write about this is Rick Hightower's latest article titled JSF CRUD Framework. It is easy for me to say that it would be no problem to create such a framework because as the saying goes "anything it possible if your not going to do it" but there are a lot of smart and hard working people in the Java community. After reading Rick Hightower's article and playing with Sun's Java Studio Creator that allows WYSIWYG creation of Java based web applications I think RoR is cool but not a threat to Java. IMHO RoR is not the "next big thing" it only looks that way since we are all looking so hard for what that is and hoping it will get here soon. Those people who have a vested interest in seeing Java continue to be a major player in the industry are not going to rollover and die. When people tell me RoR means the end of Java my care factor is low and yours should be as well.
December 3rd, 2005 at 1:32 am
Java already has several CRUD frameworks. One of these is RIFE/Crud and it has received a very favorable adoption on TheServerSide (http://www.theserverside.com/news/thread.tss?thread_id=37249).
December 3rd, 2005 at 7:12 am
Thank you for the feedback Geert. I was not aware of there already being a CRUD framework(s) for Java since I’ve never heard of one. I’ll check this one you refer to on the ServerSide out.
December 3rd, 2005 at 11:21 am
Have you tried Grails http://grails.codehaus.org/ ?
December 4th, 2005 at 7:26 am
Tug,
I have not tried GRails. However, you are the second person to mention it to me within the past week. I’ll take a look at it but at the moment I’m trying to put something together using RoR and I’m trying to remain focused on it at the moment.
Jason
December 5th, 2005 at 3:01 am
There is also Trails and Sails:
https://trails.dev.java.net
http://www.opensails.org
Mats
December 8th, 2005 at 11:34 pm
hi guys, perhaps you are interested to check out this ->
https://appfuse.dev.java.net/
it’s a pretty cool & practical CRUD framework to kickstart our projects.
December 9th, 2005 at 5:46 am
Thanks FS,
I just watched the video and AppFuse looks pretty good. Based on that is looks as though it is using Spring and Hibernate, which is my target platform these days. I’m going to download and cover this in a future entry. It also looks as if a lot more is being bundled into the “scaffolding” than your average RoR application. However, I will need to look closer to be sure.
Jason
December 9th, 2005 at 12:03 pm
Funny thing is, scaffolding is actually the *weakest* part of RoR. The CRUD screens it generates are positively weak, and customizing their look means working with repulsively primitive erb templates (though this is changing).
What *is* great about Rails however, is the overall philosophy of sensible autogenerated defaults, of which scaffolding is only one example. ActiveRecord is chock full of DWIM magic (Do What I Mean).
What sucks about Rails is that it’s pretty well tied to DHH and his personality. Just bringing up I18N turns into a contest of wills, and the Rails community comes out the loser. This isn’t so bad for intranet apps, but turns out to be a real deal-breaker for commercial ones.
December 12th, 2005 at 2:24 am
Hi Jason,
I’ve never tried Ruby On Rails though i heard of it from Appfuse’s creator Matt Raible.
Appfuse is basically a frameworks combination which cover the web MVC + spring container + ORM plus alot of others quite commonly needed features. It could really speed up fusing off your project.
Ya, I’m sure it’ll be fruitful to learn more about appfuse.
http://raibledesigns.com/wiki/Wiki.jsp?page=AppFuseQuickStart
June 19th, 2006 at 4:48 pm
Take a look to the Roma Framework!
http://www.romaframework.org
I built a Ajax-ed web application with many CRUDs in just two hours. It uses JDO and JPOX implementation for OR mapping. Very cool!
March 6th, 2008 at 9:26 am
Have you seen WaveMaker. It is a open source visual Drag and Drop Java Development environment for building standard web applications. It uses Dojo, Spring and Hibernate. It allows you to quickly build AJAX apps from databases and it consumes web services. You can create full CRUD capabilities on a table in about 15 minutes, and a full CRUD wizard is coming soon.
August 7th, 2008 at 9:57 pm
See.
http://carlgira.blogspot.com/
Web java crud Generator Using Crank Framework.
December 6th, 2008 at 4:32 am
I made one for ASP.net and SQL Server. It is open source and it would be nice if someone ported it to Java.
http://www.evolutility.org
December 12th, 2008 at 7:42 pm
Following is a 100% web based java CRUD framework to develop applications on demand.
http://www.datafacade.com
January 23rd, 2010 at 12:02 am
Check out Tynamo (http://tynamo.org), continuation of Trails framework. It’s a no-nonsense CRUD framework and more.
January 23rd, 2010 at 9:53 pm
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July 13th, 2010 at 8:38 am
If you need a Java-only framework, I propose you the Roma Framework. It is mature now with a good documentation (mid of 2010), and you can create your first CRUD application within two hours.
I prefer Rails or Grails, but therefore you have to learn another language first
Best regards,
Kai