August 29th, 2007 Posted by Don Albrecht
Name: ext Javascript Library
URL: http://extjs.com
Native Server Environment: None
Included Widgets: Grids, Layouts, Panels, Menus, Buttons, Form, Tree, ComboBox, Dialog, Tab Panel
Download Size: VariableOriginally developed as an add on library for the YUI toolkit, ext has emerged as a powerful and capable toolkit in its own right. Ext has a powerful focus on widgets and application construction similar to Dojo’s dijit system. It’s biggest strength, however, is the fact that it can float on top of just about any underlying AJAX library or stand on its own.
Some Highlights
- Powerful animation & effect tools
- Excellent editable grid widget
- Compatible with several major AJAX libraries
- YUI
- Scriptaculous / Prototype
- jQuery
- Powerful Skinning System
Some Drawbacks
- A bit of a learning curve
- Demo’s & tutorials may not work due because they were coded for different underlying library
- Depends on underlying library for many key functions, some features don’t work well with all libraries.
- Focus on XML or JSON for some tasks & in documentation
August 14th, 2007 Posted by Don Albrecht
Here are 5 open source WYSIWYG editors you might consider for your upcoming development projects. Rich Text Editors are one of the workhorses of modern web applications. Providing simplified wysiwyg formating of content for forms, RTEs have become a favorite among users.
Tiny MCE stands out as the most popular of the modern editors. The high flexibility, simplified theming and extreme ease of use the editor provides are highly regarded and well praised. Some key features:
- Microsoft Word Cleanup Filter
- Ability to fine tune available buttons
- Ability to restrict html to certain css styles
- Excellent Media import tools
- Simple API for custom features
- Skinable
A venerable successor to HTMLArea, Xinha combines flexibility with a slick interface. Although once relegated primarily to the Zope / Plone universe. Xinha has lately emerged as a powerful stand alone editor. Many developers prefer its media & css tools to those of Tiny MCE
- Microsoft Word Cleanup Filter
- Highly Configurable
- Ability to restrict html to certain css styles
- Powerful Media import tools
- Skinable
Although still popular, FCK editor doesn’t compete as well against the top tier wysiwyg editors as it once did. The interface seems clunky, especially compared to Xinha or Tiny MCE. And there’s always the issue of the name, I’ve had it shot down from a project spec because of it. The software is included here out of completeness and the fact that it is still widely used and adopted.
- Extensive capabilities
- Established & heavily deployed
The Dojo Editor Widget is an integral part of the Dojo Ajax Toolkit. It is included here because of the compelling features that make it unique. Chief among these features is the ability to share one toolbar across multiple editor instances. It is this ability to provide a traditional application toolbar feel when multiple editors are in use that sets the Dojo Editor apart and inspired me to include it here today.
- Skinable
- Shared Toolbar Support
- Powerful API
Finally, an editor that works in Safari. Built on the YUI toolkit, the beta form of the Yahoo Rich Text Editor was designed from the ground up to work in Safari. By coding for Safari first and then modifying the code to create something that worked in Opera, Firefox & Internet Explorer. Dav Glass created a cross platform editor that surpasses every other editor in this list for browser support. The other unique feature of the YUI editor is web 2.0 / Mashup support and integration. By integrating a unique Flickr photo picker & useful insert link tools the YUI RTE has emerged as a force to be reckoned with in the WYSIWYG world.
- Flickr Photo Picker
- Link Picker Tools
- Powerful API
- Skinable
- Safari Support
August 14th, 2007 Posted by Don Albrecht
Dav Glass talks about the work & decisions that went into the new YUI Rich Text Editor.
You can read his article here:
YUIBlog.com
Filed under Uncategorized
August 13th, 2007 Posted by Don Albrecht
There are two extremely powerful CSS frameworks available to web developers at this time: blueprint & yui css. Both provide a basic css reset, simplified font formating & powerful layout tools. It is the layout tools that will most influence your decision as to which framework makes sense for your project.
Blueprint is based on a strict layout grid. All objects are defined in terms of 14 columns that define a 950px wide layout. Complex layouts can be defined by carefully constructing columns & collections of columns. There is no limit to recursive depth, however no column can be less than 70 pixels wide and all columns are a multiple of 70 pixels. This ensures that everything on the page lines up cleanly.
YUI uses a more flexible template & divider route. All YUI layouts begin as a document with a predefined width ( 750px, 950px, 974px, 100% or a custom width). A single sidebar can then be added to the left or right in a predefined width ( 160px, 180px, 240px, 300 px). Lastly, the body can be recursively divided using grid tools into thirds, quarters & halves.
So, which one should you use?
Use YUI if you need a layout in a dimension other than 950px or if your layout requires division by thirds or quarters across the entire width.
Don’t use YUI if you need to create objects that are a width other than 2/3, 1/3, 1/2, 1/4 or 3/4 of their container e.g. (5/6, 7/8) or if you need more precise control of dimensions.
Use Blueprint if you need fine grained control & precise positioning in a standard 950px layout. Generally, Blueprint based layouts are much more manageable over the long run & easier to code. Unfortunately they have higher bandwidth consumption & fewer options than a YUI layout.
August 1st, 2007 Posted by Don Albrecht
Name: YUI (The Yahoo! User Interface Library)
URL: http://developer.yahoo.com/yui/
Native Server Environment: none
Included Widgets: AutoComplete, Button, Calendar, Color Picker, Container, DataTable, Logger, Menu, Rich Text Editor, Slider, TabView, TreeView
Download Size: 6.5 mb (build directory)
YUI or the Yahoo! User Interface Libary. Is one of the most used toolkits on the market today. Because free hosting for the toolkit is provided by Yahoo on its content distribution network, download times can be dramatically reduced for end users. This is especially true if the user already has a copy of the toolkit cached from visiting one of the myriad of Yahoo or third party sites that use the library.
The library itself is capable and easy to work with. It doesn’t go to great effort to abstract away core javascript functionality. It also does a remarkable job of providing complex capabilities with a reasonably simple and fine grained approach. The library doesn’t rely on monolithic JS files or complex syntax and there for is highly approachable for the novice developer.
Some Highlights
- CSS resources empowering css-resets, fonts, & layout grids
- Effects & animation tools
- Rapidly Growing Widget Set
- Dramatic bandwidth and caching improvements due to Yahoo!’s hosting of library files
- Powerful server communication tools including asset management functions
- Big name industry backing
- Cached library can be utilized between sites.
- Yahoo uses its own library
Some Drawbacks
- Skinning System still in its infancy
- Many Widgets still in beta
- Large library size on initial download
- Lack of compressed download requires dependence on Yahoo hosting for efficiency in many situations
Filed under Uncategorized
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