At the moment, I’m working on project where we are using SOAP Webservices to connect the SAP Backend with the Flex Frontend. Before I joined the project, they used a e4x to parse the SOAP Webservice responses. I switched the implementation to use as reponse type object instead of E4X or XML. This switch brings advantages and disadvantages.
Out of the box the Flex soap decoder can handle all objects which are of any type defined be the XSD Schema( string, date, int, boolean…). If your webservice contains ComplexType Objects, you have to define a mapping between the XML structure coming back from the webservice and corresponding ActionScript3 Object. This can be done by using the SchemaTypeRegistry, where you have register your custom classes and collections.
I recommand to add this stuff to SchemaTypeRegistry after the WSDL of webservice was loaded.
Sometimes registration solves not all the decoding problems, that can happen if the WSDL contains Message Parts. In this case, the top level/root object of webservice response will not decoded properly and returns an untype object. To solve this issue, you have to change some parameters of the interface ISOAPDecoder, which is implemented by the decoder of the webservice operation.
This can changes can only applied when the WSDL was successful loaded, otherwhise the step will fail with a NullPointerException.
To get all the necessary information to apply this changes is a little bit tricky if you want to do it manually. I’m using the “Import Web Service (WSDL)” function of Flex Builder 3 to get the information and simply copy and paste them into my project. If your webservice has the name “SearchService” then the importer generates an ActionScript File with the name “BaseSearchService”. You can find all information for your changes in that file.
An other benefit of the importer is the generation of the corresponding ActionScript Class, which speeds up the development of the Flex application when you’re using webservice. Replacing of an complete webservice can be done in a couple minutes.
Now, you asking yourself why I’m not directly using the generated service and classes of the importer. This is a good question. I’m not really liking the code of the generated classes, it creates a wrapper based on an AbstractedWebservice and it isn’t as easy to apply any changes on it. Also if you are working with MVC frameworks like Cairngorm or PureMVC, the wrapper isn’t a valid solution. These frameworks are using Responders and AsyncTokens to handle server responses, but the wrappers are only providing EventListeners and that fits not really together.
The disadvantage of using SchemaType mapping to decode your webservice calls is speed of the decoding. The decoding via SchemaType can take multiple seconds whereas the parsing of the webservice response via E4X or XML needs only a few milliseconds.
James Ward from Adobe provides a small application, which visualize the speed difference between E4X and SchemaType.
My recommandation is to use SchemaType mapping in the early stage of the project or in projects where the webservice will be changed a lot during the development. It’s easier to update the SchemaType mapping and you can’t forgot to map something like you will do if you create your custom mapping with E4X, trust me.
Development Speed vs. Application Speed
Now, you only have decide if you want to exchange the parsing of your webservice before releasing your application. The parsing of the webservice response with a custom mapping based on EX4 is lot faster than SchemaType and users hate nothing more than applications that are slow.
Adobe released new version of Tour de LiveCycle for ES2. It’s a seperate installation and isn’t replacing the Tour de LiveCycle. That means you have to install the Tour de LiveCycle for ES2 to get ES2 specific content.
The next version of Adobe LiveCycle will shipped soon and Adobe presented some of the new feature and applications at Adobe MAX in Los Angeles. Adobe presented a LiveCycle Workspace Mobile, a mobile version of Workspace for the Apple iPhone, BlackBerry RIM and Windows Mobile. The iPhone application of Adobe Workspace is now available at the Apple iTunes. The mobile clients will only work together with the upcoming version of LiveCycle ES.
LiveCycle LaunchPad is an other new client, which will be available with LiveCycle ES 2. LaunchPad is a desktop application based on Adobe AIR and enables the user to create PDF or secure documents via Drag and Drop. Developers can easly extend LauchPad with their own processes.
An other new feature of LiveCycle ES 2 is LiveCycle Mosaic. LiveCycle Mosaic is a framework, which let you build rich internet applications based on existing entreprise applications. The information of a existing application will presented as a “Tile” in Mosiac and the different tiles can interaction to exchange information and trigger actions. You can use Flex and HTML to build the tiles.
Adobe is working on a version of the Flex framework for mobile application, Codemane Slider. When I watched the video about the Slider Preview at Max presentation by Ely Greenfield (Adobe), I was totally impressed about the ideas behind Slider. I like the idea how to solve the to integrate into multiple plattforms and Cross Platform developement based on Conditions and Style/Skins. If you want to now what I’m talking about, check the video below. Adobe provides also a white paper at Adobe Labs.
Adobe announced Flash applications for the iPhone at the keynote of Adobe Max 2009. With the upcoming version of Flash Professional (CS5), Adobe provides the possiblity to export Flash applications as native iPhone applications. Flash CS5 converts the ActionScript3 projects and creates ipa files, which can submitted to Apple iPhone AppStore. Six Flash based samples apps are already available at the AppStore, more details can found here. So, this solution let you build iPhone application with your existing skills and tool set, no Xcode or Objective-C needed.
Furthermore, their is no Flash Plugin for the Browser Safari available. Since yesterday, Adobe had also set up a new website, when you try to install Flash player on the iPhone. Adobe get it to the point why it’s not available Check out the link.
This is the MystHackers video from the Adobe Max Keynote with Kevin Lynch (CTO) and Johnny Loiacono (SVP Creative Suite Unit) test possiblities how to get Flash on the iPhone.
An other interesting fact about this soultion is that you need no Mac computer anymore to build iPhone applicatons.
More information about Flash apps for iPhone can founded on:
The final version of Spring BlazeDS Integration 1.0 is available now. Since RC2, SpringSource enhanced the documentation and made some improvements on the messaging adapter. More information about the final version are available on the blog of SpringSource and in the offical annoucement.
You can download the BlazeDS Integration here and the documentation can found here.
Adobe published to AIR applications around Adobe LiveCycle. The first application is the big brother of Tour de Flex, called Tour de LiveCycle. This applications provides all nessecary information to start programming and using Adobe LiveCycle.
Tour de LiveCycle at Adobe Developer Connection: Link
The other application call LiveCycle Cafe and provides the latest news, upcoming events and other information around Adobe LiveCycle ES. So you can’t miss anything what’s going with Adobe LiveCycle ES.
LiveCycle Cafe at Adobe Developer Connection: Link
If you wanted to track a Flash or Flex based application with Google Analytics, you had to use the ExternalInterface to call the function of the JavaScript library. While search for a solution which isn’t using JavaScript, I found out that Google now provides some ActionScript3 libraries for Google Analytics.
You can find the documentation here and the libraries here.
The nice thing about the library is that you have the choice whether you want to use a ActionScript-Only solution or combine JavaScript and ActionScript. The only difference between both solutions is one parameter when calling of constructor of the tracker.
On Wednesday, I found the time to test the annotation based configuration of the Spring BlazeDS Integration. Because it isn’t as easy as I thought, I wrote this little guide with all necessary configurations. You can download the sample project here.
First you have to create a new Flex Project in Flex Builder, select as Application server type “J2EE” and use LiveCycle Data Service as Remoting. Click the button “Next”.
Now you have to select the BlazeDS WAR file and click the button “Finish”.
Under Project > Properties > Flex Compiler you have add -services and behind the path to the services-config.xml (Screenhot), like in all other BlazeDS oder LiveCycle DS Applications. During the compile process the compiler creates an Actionscript class with the information of this file. The services-config.xml can found under the WEB-INF/flex. This file contains the definition of the MessageBroker and references to the messaging-config.xml and the remoting-config.xml. In the remoting-config.xml, you can find the definitions of the RemoteObjects and in the messaging-config.xml all messaging configurations.
You can delete these two files because the RemoteObjects and Messaging will now defined in your Spring application. You must also delete the references to these files in the services-config.xml. The content of the services-config.xml should now look like this.
<?xmlversion="1.0"encoding="UTF-8"?><services-config><services><service-includefile-path="proxy-config.xml"/><default-channels><channelref="my-amf"/></default-channels></services><security><login-commandclass="flex.messaging.security.TomcatLoginCommand"server="Tomcat"/><!-- Uncomment the correct app server <login-command class="flex.messaging.security.TomcatLoginCommand" server="JBoss"> <login-command class="flex.messaging.security.JRunLoginCommand" server="JRun"/> <login-command class="flex.messaging.security.WeblogicLoginCommand" server="Weblogic"/> <login-command class="flex.messaging.security.WebSphereLoginCommand" server="WebSphere"/> --><!-- <security-constraint id="basic-read-access"> <auth-method>Basic</auth-method> <roles> <role>guests</role> <role>accountants</role> <role>employees</role> <role>managers</role> </roles> </security-constraint> --></security><channels><channel-definitionid="my-amf"class="mx.messaging.channels.AMFChannel"><endpointurl="http://{server.name}:{server.port}/{context.root}/messagebroker/amf"class="flex.messaging.endpoints.AMFEndpoint"/></channel-definition><channel-definitionid="my-secure-amf"class="mx.messaging.channels.SecureAMFChannel"><endpointurl="https://{server.name}:{server.port}/{context.root}/messagebroker/amfsecure"class="flex.messaging.endpoints.SecureAMFEndpoint"/><properties><add-no-cache-headers>false</add-no-cache-headers></properties></channel-definition><channel-definitionid="my-polling-amf"class="mx.messaging.channels.AMFChannel"><endpointurl="http://{server.name}:{server.port}/{context.root}/messagebroker/amfpolling"class="flex.messaging.endpoints.AMFEndpoint"/><properties><polling-enabled>true</polling-enabled><polling-interval-seconds>4</polling-interval-seconds></properties></channel-definition><channel-definitionid="my-longpolling-amf"class="mx.messaging.channels.AMFChannel"><endpointurl="http://{server.name}:{server.port}/{context.root}/messagebroker/amflongpolling"class="flex.messaging.endpoints.AMFEndpoint"/><properties><polling-enabled>true</polling-enabled><polling-interval-seconds>5</polling-interval-seconds><wait-interval-millis>60000</wait-interval-millis><client-wait-interval-millis>1</client-wait-interval-millis><max-waiting-poll-requests>200</max-waiting-poll-requests><user-agent-settings><!-- MSIE 5, 6, 7 default max number of permanent HTTP connections is 2. --><user-agentmatch-on="MSIE"max-streaming-connections-per-session="1"/><!-- MSIE 8 max number is 6. --><user-agentmatch-on="MSIE 8"max-streaming-connections-per-session="5"/><!-- Firefox 1, 2 max number is 2. --><user-agentmatch-on="Firefox"max-streaming-connections-per-session="1"/><!-- Firefox 3 max number is 6. --><user-agentmatch-on="Firefox/3"max-streaming-connections-per-session="5"/><!-- Safari 3, 4 max number is 4. --><user-agentmatch-on="Safari"max-streaming-connections-per-session="3"/><!-- Chrome 0, 1, 2 max number is 6. --><user-agentmatch-on="Chrome"max-streaming-connections-per-session="5"/><!-- Opera 7, 9 max number is 4.--><user-agentmatch-on="Opera"max-streaming-connections-per-session="3"/><!-- Opera 8 max number is 8. --><user-agentmatch-on="Opera 8"max-streaming-connections-per-session="7"/><!-- Opera 10 max number is 8. --><user-agentmatch-on="Opera 10"max-streaming-connections-per-session="7"/></user-agent-settings></properties></channel-definition><channel-definitionid="my-streaming-amf"class="mx.messaging.channels.StreamingAMFChannel"><endpointurl="http://{server.name}:{server.port}/{context.root}/messagebroker/streamingamf"class="flex.messaging.endpoints.StreamingAMFEndpoint"/></channel-definition><!-- <channel-definition id="my-http" class="mx.messaging.channels.HTTPChannel"> <endpoint url="http://{server.name}:{server.port}/{context.root}/messagebroker/http" class="flex.messaging.endpoints.HTTPEndpoint"/> </channel-definition> <channel-definition id="my-secure-http" class="mx.messaging.channels.SecureHTTPChannel"> <endpoint url="https://{server.name}:{server.port}/{context.root}/messagebroker/httpsecure" class="flex.messaging.endpoints.SecureHTTPEndpoint"/> <properties> <add-no-cache-headers>false</add-no-cache-headers> </properties> </channel-definition> --></channels><logging><targetclass="flex.messaging.log.ConsoleTarget"level="Warn"><properties><prefix>[BlazeDS] </prefix><includeDate>false</includeDate><includeTime>false</includeTime><includeLevel>false</includeLevel><includeCategory>false</includeCategory></properties><filters><pattern>Endpoint.*</pattern><pattern>Service.*</pattern><pattern>Configuration</pattern></filters></target></logging><system><redeploy><enabled>false</enabled><!-- <watch-interval>20</watch-interval> <watch-file>{context.root}/WEB-INF/flex/services-config.xml</watch-file> <watch-file>{context.root}/WEB-INF/flex/proxy-config.xml</watch-file> <watch-file>{context.root}/WEB-INF/flex/remoting-config.xml</watch-file> <watch-file>{context.root}/WEB-INF/flex/messaging-config.xml</watch-file> <watch-file>{context.root}/WEB-INF/flex/data-management-config.xml</watch-file> <touch-file>{context.root}/WEB-INF/web.xml</touch-file> --></redeploy></system></services-config>
Now you have to configurate the Dispatcher Servlet, which get the information from the Flex application. Normally, you can find the definition of the MessageBroker Servlet in the web.xml. The Spring BlazeDS integration defines the MessageBroker in applicationContext.xml and uses a Dispatcher Servlet to transfer the Flex request to the MessageBroker. So, you have to replace the Flex related configuration in the web.xml. The file should now look like this:
Now, you need a configuration file for the DispatcherServlet. Because I named the DispatcherServlet instance “dispatcherServlet”, I have to create a file with the name “dispatcherServlet-servlet.xml” in the folder WEB-INF.
The next step is to configurate the MessageBroker in applicationContext.xml. Till now, you can use also for not annotated configuration of Spring BlazeDS integration.
A annotated configuration needs some additional lines to scan the source for the spring annotations. The base-package specifies where Spring should start to search for annotations.
The last step is to add the annotation in the Java class. You have to add the @Services, the @RemoteDestintion and the protocol you will use for the transfer above the class definition. When a method should be accessable via BlazeDS, you have to add above this method @RemoteInclude annotation otherwhise the @RemoteExclude annotation.
packagetest;importorg.springframework.flex.remoting.RemotingDestination;importorg.springframework.flex.remoting.RemotingExclude;importorg.springframework.flex.remoting.RemotingInclude;importorg.springframework.stereotype.Service;
@Service
@RemotingDestination(channels={"my-amf","my-secure-amf"})publicclass SampleService {// accessable via BlazeDS
@RemotingInclude
publicString getMessage(String name){return"Hello "+name;}// not accessable via BlazeDS
@RemotingExclude
publicString getMessage2(String name){return"Hello "+name;}}
The name of the RemoteObject is same as Java class name but with the first letter is a lowercase. In my example the name of the RemoteObject is “sampleService”.
