GUI apps or web based apps

[joao coelho]

We have a character based application that runs on unix. We want to
be able to run the app both on unix and windows, so we thought about
using java but as it happens since our app also must be used with
winterms which provide either browser capability or terminal emulator
capability we thought it would be best to go ahead and work on making
our application web based using Java - one of the reasons we selected
java is because the database vendor will be using java for the
embedded database. As i get more involved with this project i started
by trying to understand how to achieve this, and it looks like a web
based app is quite a complex process. So i started with writing a
very small app that opens up the database and adds some data to it.
However, i now am not sure how to proceed: how do i create the form
for the data. I am using netbeans for the ide and i don't know if one
can use the gui tools ( awt, the J* forms ) for this project and use
them on a browser or do i need specific tools for creating apps on a
browser? I am using J2EE and NetBeans 3.6. Any suggestions would be
appreciated. Thanks.

[perry]

write your app to be either stand-alone or enclosed in an applet.
applets are very easy to use with a browser, however you may have to
write a certificate to allow your applet to access files. it's not
difficult to do as there are plenty of examples and once you create a
security layer you'll be glad that you did. unless your are connecting
to the database vendor via either a client/server (or servlet)
relationship, in which case security is already handled for you.

as for forms, awt is standard issue, J* forms can be packaged. you might
also want to check out either eclipse or jbuilder if you are running
into problems with netbeans.

- perry

joao coelho wrote:

We have a character based application that runs on unix. We want to
be able to run the app both on unix and windows, so we thought about
using java but as it happens since our app also must be used with
winterms which provide either browser capability or terminal emulator
capability we thought it would be best to go ahead and work on making
our application web based using Java - one of the reasons we selected
java is because the database vendor will be using java for the
embedded database. As i get more involved with this project i started
by trying to understand how to achieve this, and it looks like a web
based app is quite a complex process. So i started with writing a
very small app that opens up the database and adds some data to it.
However, i now am not sure how to proceed: how do i create the form
for the data. I am using netbeans for the ide and i don't know if one
can use the gui tools ( awt, the J* forms ) for this project and use
them on a browser or do i need specific tools for creating apps on a
browser? I am using J2EE and NetBeans 3.6. Any suggestions would be
appreciated. Thanks.

[joao coelho]

Thanks for the reply.
Our app is quite large and complex: many data entry screens. Should
every screen be an applet ? Our original app has menus from where
windows/forms ( character based that is) are used extensively. I am
not sure if applets are only for small applications or can be used
with menus, etc...

And what is the difference between awt and j* forms, just the fact
that J* forms can be packaged ?
Again thank you.
perry <pe***@cplusplus.org> wrote in message news:<2W*********************@news20.bellglobal.co m>...

write your app to be either stand-alone or enclosed in an applet.
applets are very easy to use with a browser, however you may have to
write a certificate to allow your applet to access files. it's not
difficult to do as there are plenty of examples and once you create a
security layer you'll be glad that you did. unless your are connecting
to the database vendor via either a client/server (or servlet)
relationship, in which case security is already handled for you.

as for forms, awt is standard issue, J* forms can be packaged. you might
also want to check out either eclipse or jbuilder if you are running
into problems with netbeans.

- perry

joao coelho wrote:

We have a character based application that runs on unix. We want to
be able to run the app both on unix and windows, so we thought about
using java but as it happens since our app also must be used with
winterms which provide either browser capability or terminal emulator
capability we thought it would be best to go ahead and work on making
our application web based using Java - one of the reasons we selected
java is because the database vendor will be using java for the
embedded database. As i get more involved with this project i started
by trying to understand how to achieve this, and it looks like a web
based app is quite a complex process. So i started with writing a
very small app that opens up the database and adds some data to it.
However, i now am not sure how to proceed: how do i create the form
for the data. I am using netbeans for the ide and i don't know if one
can use the gui tools ( awt, the J* forms ) for this project and use
them on a browser or do i need specific tools for creating apps on a
browser? I am using J2EE and NetBeans 3.6. Any suggestions would be
appreciated. Thanks.