Tutorial Questions

Hi,

I just finished working through the Address Book tutorial, and I have
a few questions:

1) When you click a surname link in the Address Book, you're taken to
the Address page.  Is it possible to have a "Return to Address Book"
link on that page?  I didn't see an obvious way to do it because the
ADemoAddressApp class has no knowledge of ADemoAddressBookApp.

2) How are images stored?  It looks like some images are stored in
methods as binary data, but DefaultWebStyle>>headerElement seems to be
using a filename ("/img/aidabannergif.gif').  What's the best way to
add a new image?  By the way, I'm using Squeak with Aida 6.0 beta1.

3) Not a question, but a comment: in Step 4 of the tutorial, the class
definitions of ADemoAddressBookApp and ADemoAddressApp are missing
their superclass (WebApplication).  It took me a few minutes to figure
that out; fortunately the previous paragraph mentions it.

Thanks,
  Randy
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Hi Randy, welcome to the list!

[hidden email] wrote:

> I just finished working through the Address Book tutorial, and I have
> a few questions:

> 1) When you click a surname link in the Address Book, you're taken to
> the Address page.  Is it possible to have a "Return to Address Book"
> link on that page?  I didn't see an obvious way to do it because the
> ADemoAddressApp class has no knowledge of ADemoAddressBookApp.

You can have a return link if you domain model provides a back reference
to parent object. In tutorial case you should introduce a parent
instance variable in Address class and set up always when you add it to
address book:

aDemoAddressBook>>addAddress: anAddress

     self addresses add: anAddress.
     anAddress parent: self.

We tried to provide some automatism in Aida for such back links in case
the model doesn't have them, but this is not as easy as it look like, so
Aida currently doesn't offer such help. Domain model should provide it.

> 2) How are images stored?  It looks like some images are stored in
> methods as binary data, but DefaultWebStyle>>headerElement seems to be
> using a filename ("/img/aidabannergif.gif').  What's the best way to
> add a new image?  By the way, I'm using Squeak with Aida 6.0 beta1.

Static content like images can be stored in two ways:

1. as files on the directory, reachable from home directory (by
    default is ./, that is where the image started from),
2. directly in methods (so called method resources/method images),
    You put suc method in your subclass of WebStyle, then by convention
    it got unique Url.

For instance (from latest dev version of Aida) :

        DefaultWebStyle #aidabannerJpg

become accessible on url:

        /img/aidabannerjpg.jpg.

But you simply call it in your code as:

        e addJpg: #aidabannerJpg.

Storing static content in methods has an advantage to be maintainable
more easibly. You can use your SCM like Monticello to maintain it. It
also ease the instalation of such app, all you need is just to load a
proper package, without needing to install some separate .zip,
downloadable form separate place, for a static content.

In Aida we have now all static content in method resources, exceptions
is only a TinyMCE rich thext editor, which still needs to be installed
separately in the home directory


> 3) Not a question, but a comment: in Step 4 of the tutorial, the class
> definitions of ADemoAddressBookApp and ADemoAddressApp are missing
> their superclass (WebApplication).  It took me a few minutes to figure
> that out; fortunately the previous paragraph mentions it.

Maintaining tutorials is usually harder that writing it. In this case
Aida/Scribo eat superclass declaration, because on VisualWorks it is in
brackets: {AIDA.WebApplication} and Scribo relatively recently start
using such brackets for scriblets.

I now changed all class declarations to Squeak ones, which are simpler
and without such brackets. Would you recheck please if class
declarations are now right?

Thanks a lot for notifying that tutorial error. Who knows, how many
others just turn away because of such error. Tutorial really need to be
perfect and without such big bugs. So anyone detecting something wrong
please report ASAP.

Best regards
Janko

--
Janko Mivšek
AIDA/Web
Smalltalk Web Application Server
http://www.aidaweb.si
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On Sat, Nov 29, 2008 at 3:51 AM, Janko Mivšek <[hidden email]> wrote:
> I now changed all class declarations to Squeak ones, which are simpler
> and without such brackets. Would you recheck please if class
> declarations are now right?

The new class declarations look good.  Thanks for all the detailed answers.

Randy
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