Thanks to its highly optimized and fully standard Java
implementation, Mac OS X is an
excellent platform for developing and deploying Java applications. The
recently released Sun Java™ Studio Creator 2 for Mac OS X—a
visual IDE for developing Web applications—only strengthens
the case.
This article provides a quick overview of Java Studio Creator
2 for Mac OS X, and explains how to download the latest version and get
started.
NOTE: For system requirements, supported systems and supported versions of Java, see the Supported Systems
section at the end of this article.
What Is Java Studio Creator?
Java Studio Creator is an easy-to-use visual tool for
developing Web
applications with Java. Designed for the corporate developer who needs
to be productive and doesn't have the time to learn the details of Java
(tm)
technologies, the product combines the Java integrated development
environment (IDE)
with a rapid visual
designer, a smart code editor,
synchronized editing, and easy deployment resulting in rapid iterative
development of Web applications and
Portlets.
Java Studio Creator on the Mac is an excellent on-ramp
to Java for any
developer and an easy way to build Web applications in Java. Built
on the solid foundation of NetBeans
developer platform plus proven
Java standard technologies like JavaServer
Faces and JDBC
Rowsets,
Java
Studio Creator provides visual access to databases and Web services,
creating a complete
Java development and deployment solution for
portable applications, portable source code, and portable developer
skill sets.
Ease of Development Features
Developers are a diverse group of professionals with
varying degrees
of coding and application development experience. Java Studio Creator
speeds development by providing a rich visual environment with an
intuitive interface for sophisticated Java application development
tasks, so that developers can start creating applications immediately.
The IDE's application model provides hooks into
sophisticated and
flexible Java technologies, so that programmers can build applications
visually, without having to delve into many of the details of Java
programming.
Its unified development environment provides access to all the elements
needed to design a Web application: user interface components;
backend data services such as Web services, databases and Enterprise
Java Beans (EJBs); query design and page
navigation. In short, Java Studio Creator does all the J2EE heavy
lifting, automatically accessing Java technologies like JavaServer
Faces
and JDBC Rowsets so that developers can master the skills they really
need to focus on to be productive.
Specific ease-of-development features include:
- Visual development environment, based on NetBeans
4.1, for layout of user interface
components, page navigation query design, access to Web services,
databases and
Enterprise JavaBeans (EJBs).
- Hooks into powerful, reliable, and proven Java
technologies like
JavaServer Faces, JDBC Rowsets, and the Java Web Services Developer
pack, making it unnecessary to master the
breadth and depth of these APIs.
- Synchronized editing so that changes made in one view are
propagated throughout the other views of the IDE, including the visual
designer property sheet and the code editors.
- Data-aware JavaServer Faces components can be configured
via drag-and-drop. For example, when developers drag a database
table onto a component, the target component automatically links the
data in the table to the control and makes intelligent choices about
how
to display the data, how to represent events, and what events to
launch.
- A visual editor for page navigation allows linking of HTML
pages quickly and visually without
any
coding required. Instead, navigation is defined by dropping a
visual representation of the connection onto the target page.
- Easy discovery and use of databases, Web
services and EJBs allow developers to drag-and-drop them right
onto a page or even a JavaServer Faces component.
- New set of JavaServer Faces components that support themes.
Figure 1
shows a sample application on
the Mac OS X user interface, Jump Start Cycles. To set the project's
visual appearance, the developer simply sets a theme using the context
menu on the Themes node (see the Projects window, lower right).
Figure 1:
Java Studio Creator User Interface on Mac OS X.
Cross-Platform Development with Java Standards
Mac OS X plus Java Studio Creator allows Java developers of
all skillsets to create portable applications among deployment
environments, and source
code that is portable across development tools. Corporate developers
charged with deploying lightweight tactical applications for day-to-day
business processes can develop rich user interfaces for complex
systems.
These developers appreciate the IDE's highly productive,
predictable development environment, quick access to existing data and
Web services, for completing applications reliably and on schedule.
Java class libraries created by an enterprise developer can be
easily
passed onto
the corporate developer for use in their Java Studio Creator
applications. An application built in Java Studio Creator can be easily
passed from the corporate to the enterprise developer to flesh out
features like transactional business logic. Or an
enterprise
developer working alone can create prototype applications quickly and
easily.
Why Do Java Development on the Mac?
Java Studio Creator is available for free after a free
registration with the Sun
Developer Network
(SDN). In addition to the tool, developers who subscribe
to SDN are equipped with everything they need to get up and running. In
addition, Apple Computer, Inc. offers the power and stability of UNIX,
with
all the standard UNIX tools, languages, and utilities, such as XCode,
NetBeans and of course, Sun Java Studio Creator, all running
on Java from Apple.
UNIX users feel at home in Darwin, the robust UNIX-based
environment
that underlies Mac OS X. That environment is accessible at any time
from
the Terminal application. All of the standard UNIX utilities and
scripting languages are included in Mac OS X-editors such as emacs, vim
and pico; file management tools such as cp, mv, ls and gnutar; shell
scripts including bash, tcsh (csh) and zsh; and scripting languages
such
as Perl, PHP, tcl, Ruby and Python. For Java-based Web engineers,
Apache, Tomcat and JBoss are also included, so you can also do JSP
development or enterprise class J2EE applications.
Mac OS X also gives you a highly mobile platform. The
PowerBook G4 or the MacBook Pro
series provides a high-powered workstation that is completely portable
and allows you to pick up and go, and then quickly resume work at a new
location. Right when you open your laptop, network connections are
reestablished and the computer is immediately up and running.
Apple has made Java a core component of Mac OS X. Every
Mac ships with
the full version of Java 2, Standard Edition included—meaning
you have
the Java Developer Kit (JDK) and the HotSpot virtual machine (VM)
without downloading, installing or configuring anything. And because
Apple has optimized Java on Mac OS X, Java applications act as
first-class citizens on this operating system.
In addition to Java Studio Creator, many of the industry
leading
tools are available, including IntelliJ's IDEA, Borland's JBuilder,
Oracle's JDeveloper, Eclipse, and Sun's NetBeans, just to name a few.
Mac OS X
also includes free developer tools including Xcode and Shark that
support rapid Java development
right out of the box.
Download a Free
Copy of Java Studio Creator 2
You can get a copy of Java Studio Creator 2 by visiting the Sun
Developer Network (SDN site) and downloading the software. The
SDN offers tutorials,
technical articles, tips, a community
forum, sample applications, technology news and much more. (Sun
Java Studio Creator 2 requires Mac
OS X v10.3 Panther or 10.4 Tiger)
Downloading and installing Java Studio Creator:
- Using your Safari browser, visit the Java Studio Creator Downloads page.
- Please register for the Sun Developer Network to
continue the download. Don't worry, it's free!
- Under Mac OS Platform - Sun Java
Studio Creator 2, click the arrow next to Sun
Java Studio Creator 2 Multilanguage.
- When the download is complete, find
and open the creator-2-mac-ml.dmg file in your Downloads folder.
- Double-click the creator-2-mac-ml.command file to start the
installer, and then follow the steps to complete the installation.
- Click the Java Studio Creator icon to launch the IDE.
The first time you run the software,
it completes a
few
remaining install
tasks—such as creating a workspace directory—before the IDE appears in your Applications folder.
Get Familiar with
the Java Studio Creator IDE
To get a quick overview of Java Studio Creator, watch the
product tour and view the screenshots on the Java
Studio Creator website. After installing and starting Java Studio
Creator, take the next step and try out a tutorial, available on the Tutorials
page. Note that some tutorials and samples require the bundled
database
to be running. To start the database, choose Data->Start Bundled
Database
To see an overview of the features click the Help menu within the IDE,
and view the Help contents.
Try Out a Sample
Application
To show off Java Studio Creator running on Mac OS X, first create a new
project based on one of the included sample
applications. This is a good place to start getting
acquainted with Java Studio Creator's features and development
environment. The next step is to follow an
exercise to extend the
sample application.
Create
a Project
- First, start the bundled database by choosing the
Data->Start Bundled Database menu item.
- Choose Create New Project from the
Welcome screen, or
select File > New Project.
A dialog box appears with a list of types of projects in the left pane.
- Choose the Sample Applications project
and
select the Jump Start Cycles application. As shown in Figure 2, click Next>
, then
click Finish. After a few seconds, the Jump Start
Cycles
sample project opens. Make sure the Project window is open, on the
right side. If the Project window is not open then open it using the
View menu.
Figure 2:
Opening the Jump Start Cycles Sample Project.
- The Jump Start Cycles project has opened once a node for
this project appears in the Projects window. Here in the Projects
window, you can open the files of the project in the Page Designer or
Java Editor to become more familiar with the project's contents.
Also, it's important to become familiar with other windows, such as the
Palette, Servers, Outline and Properties windows. If these windows are not visible, you can
open them from the View menu.
- The Servers window shares space with the Palette. To
switch to the Servers window, simply click on the Servers tab at the
top of the window. Another useful window contains Dynamic
Help. When a component of a Page is selected, the Dynamic Help
contents update automatically with relevent Help topics.
- In addition to the Designer and the Java Editor, there
is also a Java Server Pages (JSP) Editor and a Navigation
Editor. The JSP Editor has syntax highlighting, tag completion,
cut/copy/paste capability and other useful Editor features.
- Page navigation is controlled in the Page Navigation
editor. For example, to connect multiple pages in a web application
together, use the Navigation editor to link the pages by selecting a
component in a page then dragging a link to another page. To open Page
Navigation, open a page in the Visual Designer, press the control key
and
click the mouse button at the same time, then choose the Page
Navigation menu item.
- The Code Clips window opens automatically when the Java
source editor is opened. To switch the editors from the Visual Designer
to JSP to
Java, simply click the tab near the top of the open editor. This is where you'll find
sample, usable source
code that can be added to a Java source file simply by selecting, then
dragging and dropping the code clip to an appropriate location in the
Java source file.
- Execute the Jump Start Cycles project by pressing the
Green arrow in the toolbar near the top or run the project from the
Projects window. After building a bicycle, login using ht for the username and ht for the password. Happy shopping!
- To learn more, try out the Getting
Started With Sun Java Studio Creator tutorial or continue on to the
next exercise.
Extend a Sample application to see Java Studio
Creator's features
Once you've become
familiar with Java
Studio Creator's features and IDE
layout, you can try extending the Jump Start Cycles Sample
application. In this
exercise, you'll replace a StaticText component with a hyperlink, add a
new page that
can be navigated to by clicking the hyperlink, add some new table
components to the new page, bind the tables to Web services and
Enterprise JavaBeans (EJB) methods, then run the modified application.
Begin Extending the Application
- From the Projects window (pane in the lower right
corner) double-click Buy.jsp, as shown in Figure 3.
Figure 3:
Opening Buy.jsp in the Jump Start Cycles Sample Application.
- Select the label Step 3: Verify
located near the
top of the Design view of Buy.jsp. Notice the elements of the page are
displayed in a
tree structure in the Outline window. (See Figure 2, lower left
pane.)
- A StaticText component with the label, Step 3:
Verify, appears selected.
- From the Palette, with the Basic section expanded and the
Outline window open,
drag a Hyperlink component and drop it directly on top of the
stepPanel3
node in the Outline window (not the design surface).
See Figure 4.
- With the hyperlink selected in the Visual Designer, use
the
Property window to set the hyperlink id
property value to orderHistory and locate the text
property and
replace Hyperlink
with Step
3: Order History.
Figure 4: Drag and Drop a Hyperlink Component to
the Outline Window below OutputText3.
Next, select outputText3 from the Outline, press the
control key and click the mouse to open the context menu. Choose Delete.
Figure 5: After Deleting outputText3.
Try Out Page Navigation
- Select a background area in the Visual Design view of
Buy.jsp. Press the control key and click the mouse
to open a context menu.
Choose Page Navigation.
- The Navigation editor opens. Again
press the control key and click the mouse to open a context menu and
choose New Page.
- Name the page OrderHistory. Note that a
node for
OrderHistory.jsp appears in the the Projects window, in the right
lower pane.
- Next,
locate Buy.jsp and click on it. The icon for the page expands and
displays the components that can be used to connect pages. Locate
the orderHistory hyperlink in Buy.jsp, click on it, and while holding
down the mouse button, drag
the connector to the OrderHistory page icon and release the mouse
button.
This creates a connection named case1.
- Next, in the Navigation editor, double-click the OrderHistory
icon. This opens OrderHistory in the Visual Designer as shown in Figure 6.
Figure 6:
OrderHistory Page Added to Jump Start Cycles and New Navigation Link
Added to Connect the Hyperlink Component to the OrderHistory Page.
Creating the OrderHistory Page
- Drag and drop two Table components from the Palette
(Basic section, shown in Figure 4), to the Visual Design view of
OrderHistory.jsp (shown in Figure 6). Here we use getCustomerOrders as shown in Figure 7.
Figure 7: Servers
Window Listing the EJB and Web
Services Methods.
Figure 8: Drop EJB
getCustomerOrders Method onto the First Table Component.
- Next, click the Servers tab (adjacent to the Palette tab).
- Expand the Enterprise Java Beans node and its Jump Start
Cycles node, then drag and drop the getCustomerOrders method onto the
first Table component in the Visual Designer. If a dialog opens with
the title
Select
a target component to receive the drop then select table1.
- Expand the Web Services node and its Jump Start Cycles
subnode then drag and drop the getCustomerOrders method onto the
second
Table component.
Using Code Clips to link the Order Information to the EJB
and Web Services Data Providers in the OrderHistory Page
- At the top of the Visual Designer, for OrderHistory, click
on the Java
tab.
This opens the source editor for OrderHistory.java.
- Locate the prerender() method. Inside the prerender()
method and after the starting brace '{' press the Enter key then type trc<space>
to create a
Try-Catch block. (<space> is the spacebar,
and
do not add any spaces after trc.)
- Notice that the Palette switches to show code clips. Code
clips are sample source code that can be
used to add functionality to your application. For more
information on code clips, see the Adding
and Managing Code Clips Online Help topic available online.
Locate the JSC:
prerender order EJB code clip. Then drag and drop the clip, as
shown in Figure 9.
try {
<code clip is dropped here>
}catch
- Create another try-catch block, same as step 2.
- Back in the Code Clips pane, locate the JSC:
prerender order Web Services code clip (see Figures 9 and 10), then
drag-and-drop the code
clip inside the second
try-catch block (just as you did in step 3).
Figure 9:
Locating the JSC: prerender order Web Services Code Clip.
Figure 10:
Using Code Clips.
- Next, click the Design tab to switch to the OrderHistory
visual design. Since the Table adjusts to the number of columns in the
data object and overlaps the right edge, you need to remove some
columns. To adjust the Table, select the Table component, press the
control key and click the mouse, chooseing Table Layout.
Here you can remove columns by selecting an item in the right pane and
clicking the left arrow button. See Figure 11 for an example.
Figure 11:
Table Layout Customizer Dialog.
Running the Application
- Make sure the Bundled database has been started by
choosing the Data->Start Bundled Database menu
item.
- Make sure that your Java code does not contain any
errors in the Java Editor (indicated by red underlines or red
boxes along the left side). Your project will not build if there are
errors in the
code.
- Click the green arrow at the top of the screen, or choose Build
> Run Project.
All your files are saved and the project begins to build. (You
can also save all your files at any time by choosing File
>
Save All). The Build Output window appears at the bottom of
the screen, displaying relevant status messages. Once
your application is built and deployed, the IDE launches your Web
browser (if it is not already running), and your
Web application appears. (See Figure 12.)
Figure 12:
Jump Start Cycles: Building a Bike.
- At the bottom left of the Web application, click each tab
and an image for a bike color, seat type, wheel type and handlebar
type, then click Next Step. Here, you can log in or
create a new account, as shown in Figure 13.
Figure 13:
Jump Start Cycles, After Submitting an Order.
- Log in and enter ht
for the user and ht for the
password. Click Next Step then click the Step
3: Order History link that you added earlier. After a
couple of seconds, the OrderHistory page appears with the Order
details as in Figure 14. The first table retrieves data using EJB methods while the
second table uses Web services to retrieve the data.
Figure 14: Viewing the
Order History.
Summary
This article explains the benefits of developing professional
Web applications using Mac OS X and Sun Java Studio Creator 2. In
addition, a short tutorial is provided to demonstrate how to extend
one of Java Studio Creator's sample applications. Mac OS X plus Java
Studio Creator 2 team up to provide an excellent development platform.
For More Information
Supported Systems
- iMac or MacBook Pro running the Intel Core Duo
processor
- Mac G5, PowerMac G5 and PowerBook G4
Supported Versions of Java on Mac
- JDK 1.4.2_05 for Mac OS X
10.3 Panther
- JDK 1.4.2_09 for Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger
Updated: 2006-05-08
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