GAE – GWT – JDO – Demo Application

Well my posts are getting a little more dispersed which is probably a function of two things.  1) My demo applications are getting longer and; 2) I just moved house, I hate packing.
Well today, or last night, I put the finishing rough touches to an application which demonstrates three key features of developing with GWT.  It demonstrates developing on the GWT framework, using Google App Engine framework, and saving and retrieving data from the BigTable database using JDO.

The application utilises two of the demo applications that come with GWT, Sticky and Showcase, and is therefore a mish mash of those, stripped out with their core functionality and then interjected with some UIBinder code.  Doing in this way enabled me to really learn what is happening in the application and get to grips with creating my own application.
The Showcase application demos, rather excellently, a good framework for developing an application.  It encapsulates different features into different packages and shows a great way of how an application might flow.  it doesn’t use MVP as I didn’t want to introduce too many new concepts at once, but it does illustrate a constructive and useful beginning.
I used Sticky application components for its use of JDO with GWT.  It demonstrates the need for client and server models, and how to process data from and back to the client.
In summary what does the demo application demonstrate:

1. How to login to the application using a Google account.
2. Conversion of GWT Showcase application to a UiBinder equivalent.
3. Use of Google App Engine (GAE) and Google Web Toolkit (GWT)
4. Use of JDO in the GAE environments.
5. Saves and retrieves records using RPC calls in GWT.

Warning: This application is a little rough around the edges, but is great if you wanna see working code in one place that demonstrates many features of the application.
I have called this demonstration SohoScheduler as it is the beginning of my replacement for my scheduling application Soho Scheduler.  Soho Scheduler is a Small Office Home Office scheduling application for small businesses.  It allows business users to book clients into a scheduling application at a currently, free, environment.  The application www.sohoappspot.com was built on Google App Engine with Python, but after seeing the power of GWT I quickly realised that this was the way forward for building web applications.  There was just one small problem, I need to learn Java and GWT.  Well after three months of learning and an enrolment in a SCJP developer course I am finally beginning to see headway in this application.
Demo will be added to the repository in due course.