Cocoon: Building XML Applications [Englisch] [Taschenbuch]

According to the official Cocoon web site, "Apache Cocoon is an XML publishing framework that raises the usage of XML and XSLT technologies for server applications to a new level. Cocoon allows you to define XML documents and transformations to be applied on it, to eventually generate a presentation format of your choice (HTML, PDF, SVG, etc.). Cocoon also gives you the possibility to apply logic to your XML files (so that the XML pipeline can be dynamic)." Cocoon: Building XML Applications is a hands-on implementation guide that teaches developers first hand how to implement the Cocoon framework in the web XML publishing system. The CD will contain installable versions of the Cocoon 2 application for Windows and Linux platforms, real-world example described in the book, and the source code for Cocoon 2 will also be included.

According to the official Cocoon web site, "Apache Cocoon is an XML publishing framework that raises the usage of XML and XSLT technologies for server applications to a new level. Cocoon allows you to define XML documents and transformations to be applied on it, to eventually generate a presentation format of your choice (HTML, PDF, SVG, etc.). Cocoon also gives you the possibility to apply logic to your XML files (so that the XML pipeline can be dynamic)." Cocoon: Building XML Applications is a hands-on implementation guide that teaches developers first hand how to implement the Cocoon framework in the web XML publishing system. The CD will contain installable versions of the Cocoon 2 application for Windows and Linux platforms, real-world example described in the book, and the source code for Cocoon 2 will also be included.

About the AuthorsAbout the Authors Matthew Langham was born in England but has lived in Germany since 1976. He has worked in the IT business since the mid-1980s. He wrote his first book on the Internet in 1993 and has since published several articles on the Net and related themes. He currently leads the open-source group at S&N AG, a software company in Paderborn, Germany. Carsten Ziegeler is the chief architect of the open-source competence center at S&N AG, Paderborn, Germany. His main focus is on web application design and object-oriented component development. He has participated in several open-source projects and is actively involved in various Apache communities. In 2001, he took over the role of release manager for the Apache Cocoon project. He has been a committer on the project since 2000 and played a major role in designing the current architecture. About the Technical Reviewers These reviewers contributed their considerable hands-on expertise to the entire development process for Cocoon: Building XML Applications. As this book was being written, these dedicated professionals reviewed all the material for technical content, organization, and flow. Their feedback was critical to ensuring that this book fits our readers' needs for the highest-quality technical information. Marcus Crafter is from Australia and currently works as a software engineer for a Melbourne-based company, ManageSoft Corporation. He has worked extensively with Internet technologies since 1996. He lives in Frankfurt, Germany, where he has been actively involved in various open-source/free software projects, including Apache Cocoon, for the past three years. Torsten Curdt is the CTO of dff internet & medien GmbH, Gottingen, Germany. He started out as a programmer in the 1980s and has been active in the IT business since the early 1990s. As dff's main software architect, he has been around since Cocoon version 1.7. He became a committer to the Cocoon project in 2001 and is involved in several other open-source software projects. A A(c) Copyright Pearson Education. All rights reserved.

Introduction

Welcome to Cocoon: Building XML Applications. We decided to write thisbook to provide additional documentation on the Cocoon open-source project.However, we also wanted to embed the Cocoon-specific information in amore-general XML application context. Therefore, we have included informationthat we hope is helpful for anyone starting out with XML.

Who Should Read This Book

This book was written for a wide audience. If you are currently wonderingwhether your application architecture should move to XML, this book providessome answers. Readers who have already decided on an XML-based architecture willfind information on open-source software that will help them build thatarchitecture. The main audience is obviously readers who are interested in theopen-source XML publishing platform Cocoon.

As for the skill set you need in order to read this book, it is written forboth the guru-developer and the site administrator. If you are more of amanager, you will also find interesting information that will help you decidewhich technology to employ when building XML applications.

Who This Book Is Not For

If you are totally into Microsoft solutions, perhaps this is not exactly theright book for you. Although you will still find helpful information on XML ingeneral, most of this book centers around open-source software.

Overview

This book begins with an introduction to Internet applications in general anddescribes how those applications have been built over the years. It also detailsthe drawbacks of HTML as a base for modern application architectures and liststhe many challenges that must be met by new Internet-based solutions.

We continue by introducing XML and XML-related technologies as a way to buildmodern application architectures. The advantages of using XML are listed, and weintroduce available software components. Using a flexible XML-based framework,such as Cocoon, allows applications to be built quickly andcost-effectively.

We then explain how to install Cocoon and provide a guide for setting up aCocoon-based system. All the needed software is contained on the companionCD.

After you have set up Cocoon, it is time to put some of the basic conceptsand components to work. The first "hands-on" chapter containsdifferent examples that show you how Cocoon can be used to build various typesof XML applications. All the detailed solutions can be built using thecomponents available in the Cocoon distribution and without any Javaknow-how.

Throughout this book, you will build more-advanced solutions in separatechapters. After each section of the book, you will use what you have learned tobuild different versions of a news portal. Each version expands on the previousone and introduces new concepts.

After you build the first version of the news portal, we go into more detailon the Cocoon architecture, but we still do this from a user perspective. Thenew concepts are then used to enhance the portal you developed.

The next two chapters cover Cocoon from a developer perspective. They requirea working knowledge of Java in order for you to understand Cocoon's innerworkings and how to design new components that can be used to extend theplatform.

The chapter that covers the advanced version of the news portal looks at howCocoon provides different ways of reaching the same goal and provides some tipson when to use which technology. This theme is expanded in the followingchapter, where we take a step back from the technical side and provide someinsight into designing applications based on Cocoon.

The final chapter contains an outlook on Cocoon's future and describessome of the developments that did not make their way into the release of Cocoonwe used when writing this book.

The appendixes round out the book and provide additional information such asAPI and component documentation, links to more information on the web, and adescription of the companion CD.

Conventions Used in This Book

This book follows a few typographical conventions:

• A new term appears in italic when it is introduced.

• Program text, functions, variables, and other "computer language" are set in a fixed, monospace font.

• A at the beginning of a line of code indicates it is part of the line above it.

© Copyright Pearson Education. All rights reserved.