Seminar OHJ-1860 (3-5 op):
Web-Oriented Software Development

Tampere University of Technology
Seminar OHJ-1860
Spring 2006

Seminar organizers:
Prof. Tommi Mikkonen
Dr. Antero Taivalsaari

Seminar Background and Motivation

The widespread adoption of the World Wide Web has fundamentally altered the landscape of software development. In the past ten years or so, the Web has become the de facto target environment for the majority of new software applications. In contrast, the programming paradigms and programming languages that we use today are still largely web-agnostic. They were designed during an era when ubiquitous networking and globally available data and resources were still an unrealized dream.

After a long, relatively stagnant period in programming language design, a new disruptive period in software development and programming language evolution has started. The beginning of this new era is witnessed by the emergence of a large number of "hybrid" technologies and systems that combine previously disjoint technologies such as XML, web servers, and scripting languages with the capabilities of more conventional object-oriented programming languages.

Such systems include:

• Ajax (http://www.ajaxinfo.com/, http://www.ajaxian.com/)
• BeanShell (http://www.beanshell.org/)
• Dojo (http://www.dojotoolkit.org/)
• E4X (also known as JavaScript for XML or ECMAScript for XML) (http://www.whoishostingthis.com/resources/e4x/)
• Groovy (http://groovy.codehaus.org/)
• Jython (http://www.jython.org/)
• Macromedia Flash (http://www.macromedia.com/flash)
• Open Croquet (http://www.opencroquet.org/)
• PHP (http://www.php.net/)
• Ruby on Rails (http://www.rubyonrails.org/, http://www.ruby-lang.org/)
• Wheat (http://www.wheatfarm.org/)
• XJ (http://www.alphaworks.ibm.com/tech/xj)

The systems listed above share some common aspects. The designers of these systems have realized that the language structures and mechanisms available in the earlier programming languages and systems are not adequate or well-suited for web-oriented software development. They are challenging the status quo in software development and programming language evolution by combining a number of previously unrelated technologies. In general, all these systems seem to have emerged because -- in the absence of proper web-oriented programming mechanisms and idioms -- software developers writing web-oriented software are repeating the same tasks over and over again in a fashion that is not adequately supported by the earlier programming languages and systems.

Seminar Goals and Format

In this seminar, we will investigate the emerging web-oriented software development technologies in the form of student presentations and group discussions, and will try to identify common patterns across these emerging systems. Students will prepare a presentation on one of the technologies that they choose, and will give a presentation in front of the seminar participants to summarize the findings. Possible presentation topics include (but are not limited to) the topics listed above.

Presentations may be prepared and presented in Finnish or English (English preferred, since there are non-Finnish-speaking participants).

Intended Audience

The seminar is intended for third-year students and up. The seminar is suitable also for Ph.D. students.

Important Dates

• February 24, 2006: Seminar opening and first get-together (Presentation slides are here)
• March 24, 2006: Student presentations started
• (see student presentation schedule below)

Seminar will be held on Fridays at 12:15 - 13:45 in Tietotalo TC210.

Student Presentation Schedule

• Ajax: Pekka Vuorela (March 24) (SLIDES)
• JavaScript/E4X: Anna Ruokonen (March 31) (SLIDES)
• PHP: Juanjuan Jiang (April 7) (SLIDES)
• XForms: Jussi Saarinen (April 7) (SLIDES)
• Groovy: Jussi Riihelä (April 28) (SLIDES)
• Ruby on Rails: Andre Santos (April 28) (SLIDES)
• Wheat: Pasi Liimatainen (May 5) (SLIDES)
• Jython: Vesa-Matti Hartikainen (May 12) (SLIDES)
• DoJo Toolkit (JavaScript): Matti Ristimäki (May 19) (SLIDES)
• Croquet: Panu Åkerman (May 19) (SLIDES)

Proposed Outline for Presentations and Seminar Reports

• Introduction (high-level overview, purpose of the technology, background, history, ...)
• Overview of the technology
• Small examples
• Walkthrough of a more complete example illustrating the use of the technology
• Evaluation (benefits, drawbacks, general usefulness of the technology, possible measurements, ...)
• Summary (a half-page summary of everything above)

Questions and Further Information

Questions related to the seminar may be sent to:
tjm@cs.tut.fi.nospam (remove ".nospam" from the address before sending).