Mastering XPages: A Step-by-Step Guide to XPages Application Development and the XSP Language [Paperback]

Martin Donnelly (Author), Mark Wallace (Author), Tony McGuckin (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 29, 2011 | ISBN-10: 0132486318 | ISBN-13: 978-0132486316 | Edition: 1

The first complete, practical guide to XPages development - direct from members of the XPages development team at IBM Lotus

 

Martin Donnelly, Mark Wallace, and Tony McGuckin have written the definitive programmer's guide to utilizing this breakthrough technology. Packed with tips, tricks, and best practices from IBM's own XPages developers, Mastering XPages brings together all the information developers need to become experts - whether you’re experienced with Notes/Domino development or not. The authors start from the very beginning, helping developers steadily build your expertise through practical code examples and clear, complete explanations. Readers will work through scores of real-world XPages examples, learning cutting-edge XPages and XSP language skills and gaining deep insight into the entire development process. Drawing on their own experience working directly with XPages users and customers, the authors illuminate both the technology and how it can be applied to solving real business problems.

 

Martin Donnelly previously led a software startup that developed and distributed small business accounting software. Donnelly holds a Commerce degree from University College Cork and an M.S. in Computer Science from Boston University.

 

Mark Wallace has worked at IBM for 15 years on many projects as a technical architect and application developer.

 

Tony McGuckin participates in the Lotus OneUI Web Application and iWidget Adoption Workgroup. He holds a bachelor's degree in Software Engineering from the University of Ulster.

Editorial Reviews

From the Back Cover

The Definitive XPages Development Guide--Straight from the XPages Team at IBM Lotus

 

XPages is the most significant improvement to Lotus Notes/Domino development in 20 years. Now, three IBM Lotus insiders have written the definitive programmer’s guide to this breakthrough web application development framework. Packed with tips, tricks, and best practices, Mastering XPages brings together all the information you need to become an XPages expert, whether you’re experienced with Notes/Domino development or not.

 

The authors begin with a high-level overview of XPages: how it works, why it works that way, and why it’s such a powerful step forward. Next, you’ll install XPages and Domino Designer, and start building your expertise through practical code examples using real-world XPages applications. As you progress, you’ll master XPages from the bottom up, gain deep insight into the entire XPages development model, and discover how XPages can be used to solve everyday application development challenges.

 

Coverage includes

•  Understanding how XPages development differs from--and is similar to--traditional Notes/Domino development

•  Getting started with XPages development using Lotus Domino Designer

•  Defining application metadata and binding XPages controls to Domino data

•  Managing all aspects of Domino view and document data

•  Navigating and linking XPages to form a cohesive application

•  Building XPages business logic using various programming technologies

•  Reading and writing XPage source (XSP markup) directly

•  Mastering XPages programming and extensibility features, including custom controls, advanced scripting, as well as creating your very own components

•  Making the most of XPages applications on the Notes client platform

•   Building slick and effective application user experiences using themes

•  Tuning XPages performance and maximizing application scalability

•  Securing applications with Access Control Lists (ACL), Execution Control Lists (ECL), and Active Content Filtering (ACF)

About the Author

The authors of this book have a number of things in common. All three hail from Ireland, work for the IBM Ireland software lab, and have made significant contributions to the development of XPages over the past number of years.

 

Martin Donnelly is a software architect and tech lead for the XPages runtime team in IBM Ireland and has worked on all three XPages releases from Notes/Domino 8.5 through 8.5.2. Prior to this, Martin also worked on XFaces for Lotus Component Designer and on JSF tooling for Rational Application Developer. In the 1990s while living and working in Massachusetts, he was a lead developer on Domino Designer. Now once again based in Ireland, Martin lives in Cork with his wife Aileen, daughters Alison, Aisling, and Maeve, and retired greyhounds Evie and Chelsea. Outside of work, he confesses to playing soccer on a weekly basis and salmon angling during the summer when the opportunity presents itself.

 

Mark Wallace is a software architect working in the IBM Ireland software lab. In the past, he worked on the XSP runtime, which was developed for Lotus Component Designer and subsequently evolved into the XPages runtime. He has a keen interest in programming models and improving developer productivity. Mark has worked in Lotus and IBM for more than 15 years on various products and is currently working on Sametime Unified Telephony. Mark lives in Dublin with his wife and two children and spends as much time as possible in the Ireland’s sunny south east enjoying fishing and kayaking with his family.

 

Tony McGuckin is a senior software engineer in the IBM Ireland software lab. Having studied software engineering at the University of Ulster, he began his career with IBM in 2006 working in software product development on the component designer runtime before moving into the XPages core runtime team. When not directly contributing to the core runtime, Tony is busy with software research and development for the next generation of application development tooling, and also engaging directly with IBM customers as an XPages consultant. Tony enjoys spending time with his wife and daughter, and getting out into the great outdoors for hill walking and the occasional chance to do some hunting in the surrounding hillsides of his native County Derry.

Product Details

• Paperback: 784 pages
• Publisher: IBM Press; 1 edition (January 29, 2011)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0132486318
• ISBN-13: 978-0132486316
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6.9 x 1.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.7 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #394,076 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Recommended reading, February 4, 2011

By 

Ulrich Krause (Mettmann, NRW Deutschland) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Mastering XPages: A Step-by-Step Guide to XPages Application Development and the XSP Language (Paperback)

"I never got the chance to meet the inventors of `Notes', but these guys were true visionaries." This is the first sentence in a 748 pages book about XPages that was recently published by IBM Press.

The book is written by Martin Donnelly, Mark Wallace and Tony McGuckin with a foreword by Philippe Riand. Although all authors declare that "none of us had been down the book-writing road before", the book is well written, even for readers that do not have english as the first language.

The main content starts with a high level overview about XPages. Even if you are already experienced in XPages development, it is worth reading this chapter. Start writing your first XPages application and follow the instructions step by step. The resulting application is a good starting point to put enhancements on top.

If you run into a problem regarding security settings on the server take a look at the very end of the book where you find the settings that have to be applied to your server.

IMHO, this information should be part of the "Getting Everything You Need" chapter.

The anatomy of an XPage is described in detail in chapter 4. Newbees to this field should read this chapter carefully. You will need this information if you want to dig deeper into XPages development later on.

Chapter 12 explains how to build your own user interface controls. This part of the book is not easy to understand for a non experienced developer, but if you follow the step by step instruction carefully, you will succeed.

All over the book you find tons of source code and numerous screenshots. It would be a good idea to make the source code available for download. But perhaps it is already available and I missed this part in the book.

The book also gives credit to all of the members of the Notes Community that started back in 8.5 with spreading the news about XPages in blogs, podcasts etc. Take these ressources as a supplement to the information you find in the book.

As a conclusion, I would recommend this book to every developer that wants to start with XPages development.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars It's about time someone wrote the book!, February 11, 2011

By 

Howard Shevitz (Doraville, GA USA) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Mastering XPages: A Step-by-Step Guide to XPages Application Development and the XSP Language (Paperback)

Unless you've been living under a rock for the last couple of weeks, you're probably aware of the newly released "Mastering XPages" book by Martin Donnelly, Mark Wallace, and Tony McGuckin. As a emerging XPages developer it couldn't have come at a better time. Since the release of XPages in 8.5 I've been trying to get some XPages development skills and it's been a pretty hit or miss effort. Although there have been some very good tutorials out there and plenty of technical tips and tricks, learning this technology is not always easy when you're a sole developer in a company who is constantly being tasked with new projects (RAD anyone?). In my case it's been almost impossible to find the time to go out to all the forums, wiki's, and blogs to gather this information together into a meaningful collection of articles.

Having said that, I have started diving into the book and it's just what I needed to pull all this information together, really filling in the gaps! Although I'm only a short way into Chapter 4, Anatomy of an XPage, I'm really "getting" it more than I've been able to in the last 2 years. I've been developing in Notes since V2 and all skills have been self taught and by example. Yep, they seem to have it nailed down!

Kudos guys!

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent!...a must have for any Domino developer learning XPages, February 10, 2011

By 

John Mackey (Nazareth, PA United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Mastering XPages: A Step-by-Step Guide to XPages Application Development and the XSP Language (Paperback)

I was very humbled when I was asked to be a technical reviewer for the new book Mastering XPages: A Step-by-Step Guide to XPages Application Development and the XSP Language by IBM Press. I refer to the authors as the "Lotus Dream Team" because who better to publish a book on XPages but the folks who have led the development effort: Martin Donnelly, Mark Wallace, Tony McGuckin, and Jim Quill. The depth of knowledge here is deep folks.

As a technical reviewer my role was to read each chapter and test each example, make sure everything worked as expected, and then provide my feedback. I can't say enough of how I enjoyed the book. It is not your typical approach for learning development in a new language. The author's approach is to have the reader learn how to do everything in the source panel first as opposed to the graphical interface. The concept is that the reader will learn XPages from the bottom up and in depth. This will lay the foundation to understand the fundamentals of the language, and provide you with the skills to read XSP markup and understand how everything works together at runtime.

Well, I have to tell you, I thought I knew XPages very well prior to reading this book. Not so! It really took my skills to the next level. I feel much more comfortable reading the XSP source and identifying an issue quickly. It's second nature now.

The other thing I enjoyed about this book, is the Author's insight into the development of this product. In various chapters they point out and explain the behind the scenes knowledge and the history of the technology..... why certain decisions were made, why things work the way they do. For example, XPages in the Notes client and the technology and challenges behind that. That type of information can only be delivered from this team of Authors, and it made the book that much more enjoyable.

Here's a list of the table of contents:

Part I Getting Started With XPages

-Chapter 1 A Little XPages History

-Chapter 2 Getting Everything You Need

-Chapter 3 Building Your First XPages Application

Part II XPages Development: First Principles

-Chapter 4 Anatomy of an XPage

-Chapter 5 XPages and JavaServer Faces

-Chapter 6 Building XPages Business Logic

Part III Data Binding

-Chapter 7 Working with Domino Documents

-Chapter 8 Working with Domino Views

-Chapter 9 Beyond the View Basics

Part IV Programmability

-Chapter 10 Custom Controls

-Chapter 11 Advanced Scripting

-Chapter 12 XPages Extensibility

-Chapter 13 XPages in the Notes Client

Part V Application User Experience

-Chapter 14 XPages Theming

-Chapter 15 Internationalization

Part VI Performance, Scalabilty & Security

-Chapter 16 Application Performance & Scalability

-Chapter 17 Security

Part VII Appendixes

-Appendix 1 XSP Tags Quick Reference

-Appendix 2 XSP Style Sheet Reference

-Appendix 3 Useful XPages Sites on the Net

I definitely recommend this book for Beginners, Intermediates, and Advanced XPage developers....there's something in there for everyone.

-John Mackey

http://www.jmackey.net