XPages: Using the powerful Design Definition in custom controls

I've recently started using the Design Definition in my custom controls to save space on the XPages they are included in.

When I first encountered this new (since Domino 8.5.1) feature, I believed it was a static feature. It turns out it's highly dynamic, and quite powerful.

Immediately, when I read the "Providing illustration for your XPage custom controls" article from the Lotus Notes and Domino Application Development wiki, I thought of JSP. What reminded me of JSP was this little snippet:
<%=this.viewName %>

I've only tested if/else statements, as I know very little JSP/haven't had the need for anything else. If you know JSP/have a blog, please test out this feature, and share your findings.

Included in todays demoapp, there is a custom control that lets you open up a "remote" Dojo dialog (dijit.Dialog). The developer can choose between using a link and a button as the "launcher". This is controlled by the property definition in the custom control.

The design definition for the control:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<xp:view xmlns:xp="http://www.ibm.com/xsp/core">
<% if(this.activationControl==='link' ){ %>
 <a href="#"><%=this.showDialogLabel || 'DojoDialogLink' %></a>
<% } else { %>
<button>
<%if( this.btnImage ){%><img src="<%=this.btnImage %>" /><%}%>
<%=this.showDialogLabel || 'DojoDialogButton' %></button><%
}%>
</xp:view>

this is (amongst other things?) the compositeData-object that contains all the properties from the property definition. this.btnImage in the design definition is the same as compositeData.btnImage in the custom control.

If you set the custom control to use a link to launch the dialog, the custom control shows up as a link in the XPage it's included in. If you change that to a button, immediately the representation of the custom control changes into a button. If you haven't typed a label for the link/button, it has the label DojoDialogLink/DojoDialogButton, depending of the action type you've chosen. When you type in a label, the link text/button label changes correspondingly. If you've chosen an image for the button, the image shows up in the XPage.

Flash video of the design definition in action:



>> Small demoapp

Share and enjoy!

Small bugfix for the XPages API tool

When you inspected a class, using the class name, e.g. java.util.ArrayList, you got the API for java.lang.Class every time. This is now fixed.

Also, when you write the name of a global object, e.g. view, the class name of the object is now the header for the table containing the methods/properties.

>> Original post with API tool

>> Download tool

XPages: Custom Control that can help prevent save conflicts

Today, I share with you a demoapp with a basic "has document been modified validation" (in lack of a better description) custom control, ccValidateModified.

Just pop it into an XPage with a document data source, and it should in theory work out of the box. Plug and play.

This is by no means an absolute protection against save conflicts. For applications that it's critical to avoid save conflicts, you need better protection.

Below is a movie of the control in action. A document is open in Opera, Firefox and Internet Explorer. When the document is saved in one of the browsers, the "other browsers" gets a dialog saying that the document has been modified.


(Click the play-icon to start. Broadband recommended.)

The way it works is that a scoped variable with the modified-time from the stored doc is set on page load (editmode).

When the window gets focus/every two seconds (setInterval), a partial refresh is initiated. If the doc has been modified since the document was opened for editing, a hidden image is loaded. The image has an onload event (easiest way to make it cross browser) -> show a modal dojo dialog.

>> Download demoapp with custom control

Share and enjoy!

Office 2007 MIME headers fixed in Domino 8.5.2

Just got word that IBM finally have implemented the Office 2007 MIME headers.

Small update on the Xpages search demo

The xpages search demo I posted last week is still messy, but I've cleaned it up a tiny bit.

I've added another parameter in the config for the search-method. You can now specify fieldName separately from the formula. I actually documented it, but forgot to implement it in the demo.

This should make it easier to refer to fields in the columns.
E.g.

TemplateSearch.search( [{ 
 fieldName: 'name', 
 formula: 'LastName + ", " + FirstName',
 dataType: 'string'
},{
 fieldName: 'modified',
 formula: '@Modified',
 dataType: 'date'
}]);

If you want to have a demo of something more in regards search-results/data tables, leave a comment, and I'll take a look at it. If it's something I can do in a relatively short amount of time, I'll make/post a demoapp with a simple description.

Comments are now open

I've got a few comments over the time of my blog that people can't comment because they don't have a google account.

I've now opened for anonymous comments, so if you want to ask me about something in regards to any of my blogposts, now's your chance.

The reason I restricted comments back in the day was because I was afraid of dealing with spam all day. Let's see how it turns out.