Eclipse Rich Ajax Platform: Bringing Rich Client to the Web (Firstpress)

By Fabian Lange

Publisher: Apress
Number Of Pages: 148
ISBN-10 / ASIN: 1430218835
ISBN-13 / EAN: 9781430218838

Product Description:

Eclipse Rich Ajax Platform (RAP) is an innovative toolkit for developing applications that will run as rich clients as well as web applications. Eclipse Rich Ajax Platform is the first book on the new Eclipse RAP, and it introduces the required RCP and OSG/i concepts used by Eclipse RAP.
This firstPress title demonstrates the functionality and benefits of Eclipse RAP as well as shows the sweet spots of RAP, especially focusing on single sourcing RCP and web applications, which can be a huge cost saver.
This book also covers possible issues that might prevent you from successfully deploying RAP.

Describes Eclipse RAP concepts and its underlying technology
Explains key features of RAP
Shows case studies where RAP works and where it won’t

What you’ll learn

Understand what the purpose of RAP is.
Learn what is required to deploy RAP applications.
Get to know how to utilize RAP features.
Develop single sourced RCP and web applications.
Solve issues when migrating a RCP application to RAP.
Determine when to use RAP or when to choose a different framework.

Who is this book for? This book is suitable for IT managers, technical leads, and developers. While the focus is on concepts and understanding the technology, developers can also find insights on how to solve specific issues. For IT managers, it shows how RAP is able to save development costs, but also presents limitations of the framework. The reader is expected to have at least basic Eclipse RCP knowledge and some complementary Java or web application development experience.

Summary: A good introduction to a new Eclipse Technology
Rating: 4
I've been following Eclipse RAP since I first saw the demo at EclipseCon 2008. The technology is very promising and the emphasis on single-sourcing is a time saver. This book is an introduction to Eclipse RAP. Don't expect an in depth review of the technology.

Chapters on how RAP is setup relative to the whole Eclipse Platform stack and comparison to Eclipse RCP is very helpful. In addition chapter that covered whether RAP will work for a particular projects was something I was interested in. I especially liked the example RAP application that author walks you through so you can get started using RAP pretty quickly.

So, if you are looking for a in depth discussion of RAP technology this is not the book yet. It is a book for someone who is not sure if the technology will work for a particular project and wants q gentle introduction. I do look forward to more in depth book on Eclipse RAP as it promises to be a very interesting technology to use.

Also, the book would have been half the size if font that was used would not have been 13 or 14 px - seems too big for me.