Google Web Toolkit 2 Application Development Cookbook Review

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Google Web Toolkit 2 Application Development Cookbook ReviewYippee!
I was quite excited when I was asked to review this book. Yes, there would presumably be quite a lot of stuff I already knew, but surely out of 70 recipes, there must be quite a lot to learn: new things I can do which I couldn't do before; new ways to do things (probably more correct that the ways I have picked up and hacked on my way from GWT v1.0 to GWT v2.1)
What a disappointment. Don't get me wrong, it's a pleasant enough read despite the occassional gramatical error, the code would appear to work (I didn't try any of it for reasons that will become clear), and it's quite easy fo follow..
So What's The Problem?
The problem is that, despite the title, it's not a cookbook (not by my definition, anyway), and it doesn't have much to do with GWT.
A cookbook for me, is a collection of solved problems, preferable organised into groups of similar recipes. You get 'The Problem', 'The Solution' and probably a discussion and background information after that. For example:
The Problem:
How To Transfer Data From JavaScript To GWT
The Solution:
Use the Dictionary class in GWT to access an array created in JavaScript
JavaScript:
var data = {"name": "Ian"};
GWT:
Dictionary dataDictionary = Dictionary.getDictionary("data");
String name = dataDictionary.get("name");
Discussion:
The Dictionary class provides dynamic string lookup of key/value
string pairs defined in a module's host HTML page. Each unique
instance of Dictionary is bound to a named JavaScript object that
resides in the global namespace of the host page's window object.
The bound JavaScript object is used directly as an associative array.
And GWT for me is is just that: GWT. This is almost entirely GXT. Or MySQL. Or iReport. Or server-side Java. Or GlassFish.
This book walks you through the development of a Sales Processing System which requires:
The GWT Software Development Kit (essential, of course)
Now, a GWT cookbook doesn't need anything else, but this book also requires:
The Java Development Kit
NetBeans (Eclipse is more popular with GWT developers, but OK there may be a market)
Glassfish
MySQL
GWT4NB
Ext-GWT - pretty much everything in the book is Ext-GWT (aka GXT) and not plain GWT
These are all required if you follow the book from start to finish (which is what is expected). Yes, they call sections 'recipes' but every one of them depends on you doing what went before. Let me explain the book's structure
Book Structure
Chapter 1
tells you how to set up the whole shebang.
Chapter 2
tells you how create a layout for a header, menu, toolbar, left sidebar, right sidebar, and a footer. This is all done using GXT's ContentPanel. In my opinion, it should be done with floated divs or, if you really have to do it in code, with GWT's FlowPanels.
There's a whole video from Google I/O 2009 dedicated to NOT using widgets if HTML and CSS will do, the main message being 'If it doesn't receive events, it shouldn't be a widget'.
Chapter 3
GXT Forms and form widgets.
Chapter 4
GXT events.
Chapter 5
Setting up a database - not through GWT, not even GXT, but via the MySQL Query Browser
Chapter 6
is about Java persistence. Now I know that GWT is written using the Java syntax, but it never becomes Java bytecode, it's compiled directly to JavaScript. GWT is JavaScript on the client's browser. Everything else isn't GWT.
There's a very good case for showing how to connect to Java on the server, in fact, I'd say it was essential, as is showing RequestBuilder so you can connect to other languages on the server (like PHP or anything else - this book doesn't do that), but that's it. Once you start getting into doing non-trivial stuff on the server, you have left GWT behind and have started to explain true Java to your reader.
Chapter 7
GWT RPC. This is the only chapter that really explains anything GWT- related at all. If I was really nasty, I'd point out that the default project that is created in Eclipse for GWT is an example of exactly this. OK, I've pointed it out, so I really am that nasty :-)
Chapter 8
Using iReport (a NetBeans plugin). iReport has nothing to do with GWT. Here the book passes parameters to iReport, creates an HTML file (or PDF) and shoves it in a Frame (i.e. an HTML iframe). What does this have to do with GWT? Apart from the service call, there's a GWT frame widget. That's it.
Chapter 9
How to deploy your GXT application to GlassFish using Netbeans to set it (and the JDBC connections) up..
Chapter 10
Using Chrome's SpeedTracer. SpeedTracer is a useful utility worthy of a mention, but a whole chapter? Again, it isn't directly related to GWT, it's a utility to check speeds of any web site built using any language at all..
Summary
'Google Web Toolkit 2 Application Development Cookbook' isn't a cookbook and has little to do with native GWT.
It appears to be written by a Java programmer who came to GWT, swept past it, and added GXT to the mix, and then carried on using all the things he'd been used to in Java.
GWT doesn't really work like that - obviously this book proves that it can, but I'd argue that it shouldn't. Ignore for a moment that this is GXT not GWT, but GWT is Ajax. GWT puts the processing load on to the client and lets the server just provide services. You don't use iReport to create a report on the server and then just whack it into an iframe. You send raw data to the client and let the client's machine (i.e. the GWT code and not the server-side Java) deal with displaying it.
If you want to know how to build a Sales Processing System using GXT (Ext-GWT), NetBeans, GWT4NB, GlassFish and MySQL, then this is the book for you, it will walk you through every step.
It's a good example of how to develop a system provided you don't mind being tied to these requirements, but it won't teach you GWT and it doesn't provide you with simple, stand-alone solutions to common problems and gotchas like a cookbook should. And following it won't add anything useful to your CV
If you want a GWT cookbook, then I'd advise that you look elsewhere.Google Web Toolkit 2 Application Development Cookbook Overview

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