integration

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Hi,

 > 1.  Does the Orbeon XForms’s XForms engine simply convert XForms to
 > (X)HTML format in the server and send the output to the browser?

Not sure what you mean by "simply", but I think that yes, that's the
idea. In addition, there is an Ajax server. See also this FAQ entry:

   http://www.orbeon.com/ops/doc/home-faq#xforms-server-side

 > If so, technically, the engine should be replaced with our AciveX
 > parsing XForms in the client.

With Orbeon Forms, you won't need ActiveX, right?

 > 2. How can the engine integrate with any ASP.NET or J2EE framework?

Orbeon Forms is written in Java.

The answer probably depends on whether you mean UI integration or
backend integration. For the UI, with ASP.NET, you could probably do
something with inclusions, but I don't know if anybody has tried that.

For Java, see in particular this part of the doc:

   http://www.orbeon.com/ops/doc/reference-xforms-java

Regarding the backend, XPL and the built-in processors allow you to
integrate with web services, JDBC, REST services, etc.

 > 3. It seems that the Orbeon Forms has Page Flow Controller to
 > navigate pages. Is it mandatory to use the built-in PFC in order to
 > get benefit of the engine?

No, you don't have to use the PFC. In particular, when using the
"separate deployment" mechanism described in the doc above, you don't
use the PFC.

 > Can the client directly request XForms page instead of letting PFC
 > looking at page-flow.xml?

In separate deployment, that is up to you. In integrated deployment,
you can write a simple page flow that does this as well and just loads
static XForms pages.

 > 4. How does the data binding work if I want to display data from
 > database?

XForms mainly uses xforms:submission to communicate with the outside
world. On the other side of the submission, you can implement database
access with XPL and our SQL processor, or use a persistence layer
implemented with any language you want.

A very easy way to implement persistence is to use an XML database,
like eXist, which directly supports a REST interface. This way, XForms
can talk to the database directly.

 > 5. If we want to add non-standard Xforms’s control, how flexible to
 > modify the source code of Orben XForms?

Very flexible as long as you know Java and the Orbeon Forms code very
well ;-)

Kidding aside, this is fairly involved. We would like to develop a
component system in the future, probably based on XBL 2, to facilitate
the development of custom controls, but this is a future feature.

-Erik

--
Orbeon Forms - Web Forms for the Enterprise Done the Right Way
http://www.orbeon.com/




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Hi Mike,

Thanks for your prompt reply. I will take a look at the link. In the mean
time, I wonder if you have any slides demonstrating Orben Form's components
and integration with diagrams.

Thanks,
Kay

-----Original Message-----
From: Erik Bruchez [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Erik Bruchez
Sent: Wednesday, September 19, 2007 1:23 AM
To: [hidden email]
Subject: Re: [ops-users] integration

Hi,

 > 1.  Does the Orbeon XForms's XForms engine simply convert XForms to  >
(X)HTML format in the server and send the output to the browser?

Not sure what you mean by "simply", but I think that yes, that's the idea.
In addition, there is an Ajax server. See also this FAQ entry:

   http://www.orbeon.com/ops/doc/home-faq#xforms-server-side

 > If so, technically, the engine should be replaced with our AciveX  >
parsing XForms in the client.

With Orbeon Forms, you won't need ActiveX, right?

 > 2. How can the engine integrate with any ASP.NET or J2EE framework?

Orbeon Forms is written in Java.

The answer probably depends on whether you mean UI integration or backend
integration. For the UI, with ASP.NET, you could probably do something with
inclusions, but I don't know if anybody has tried that.

For Java, see in particular this part of the doc:

   http://www.orbeon.com/ops/doc/reference-xforms-java

Regarding the backend, XPL and the built-in processors allow you to
integrate with web services, JDBC, REST services, etc.

 > 3. It seems that the Orbeon Forms has Page Flow Controller to  > navigate
pages. Is it mandatory to use the built-in PFC in order to  > get benefit of
the engine?

No, you don't have to use the PFC. In particular, when using the "separate
deployment" mechanism described in the doc above, you don't use the PFC.

 > Can the client directly request XForms page instead of letting PFC  >
looking at page-flow.xml?

In separate deployment, that is up to you. In integrated deployment, you can
write a simple page flow that does this as well and just loads static XForms
pages.

 > 4. How does the data binding work if I want to display data from  >
database?

XForms mainly uses xforms:submission to communicate with the outside world.
On the other side of the submission, you can implement database access with
XPL and our SQL processor, or use a persistence layer implemented with any
language you want.

A very easy way to implement persistence is to use an XML database, like
eXist, which directly supports a REST interface. This way, XForms can talk
to the database directly.

 > 5. If we want to add non-standard Xforms's control, how flexible to  >
modify the source code of Orben XForms?

Very flexible as long as you know Java and the Orbeon Forms code very well
;-)

Kidding aside, this is fairly involved. We would like to develop a component
system in the future, probably based on XBL 2, to facilitate the development
of custom controls, but this is a future feature.

-Erik

--
Orbeon Forms - Web Forms for the Enterprise Done the Right Way
http://www.orbeon.com/






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Kay,

On 9/19/07, Kay Hye Kyeong You <[hidden email]> wrote:
> Thanks for your prompt reply. I will take a look at the link. In the mean
> time, I wonder if you have any slides demonstrating Orben Form's components
> and integration with diagrams.

All the published diagrams are in the documentation which you can find
online. The closest diagram to what you are asking is maybe this one:

http://www.orbeon.com/ops/doc/home-faq#xforms-server-side

Alex
--
Orbeon Forms - Web 2.0 Forms, open-source, for the Enterprise
http://www.orbeon.com/



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Hi Alex,

It was nice to talk with you earlier with regards to integration.

I have another question with the level of standard as below:

1.Does the Orbeon Forms fully support all standard spec of XForms 1.0?
2.It is said online that Orbeon supports part of XForms 1.1. Can you list
what those are?
3.Our product not only supports the standard of XForm 1.0 spec but also has
non-standard controls implemented.
  In the sense, we need to modify/add source code to comply with our
nonstandard.  
  I assume if we know java code and orbeon code structure very well, it will
be easy to extend the engine.
  However, is there standardized ways to do so? If so, please let me know
the big procedures.
  If not, how much efforts are needed to dig into the orbeon's source codes?
How well documentated?
   
Thanks for your support,
Kay

-----Original Message-----
From: [hidden email] [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Alessandro
Vernet
Sent: Wednesday, September 19, 2007 2:46 PM
To: [hidden email]
Subject: Re: [ops-users] integration

Kay,

On 9/19/07, Kay Hye Kyeong You <[hidden email]> wrote:
> Thanks for your prompt reply. I will take a look at the link. In the
> mean time, I wonder if you have any slides demonstrating Orben Form's
> components and integration with diagrams.

All the published diagrams are in the documentation which you can find
online. The closest diagram to what you are asking is maybe this one:

http://www.orbeon.com/ops/doc/home-faq#xforms-server-side

Alex
--
Orbeon Forms - Web 2.0 Forms, open-source, for the Enterprise
http://www.orbeon.com/





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Kay Hye Kyeong You wrote:
> Hi Alex,
>
> It was nice to talk with you earlier with regards to integration.
>
> I have another question with the level of standard as below:
>
> 1.Does the Orbeon Forms fully support all standard spec of XForms 1.0?

No, we have some holes. We have a long-standing action item to clearly
document what is supported and not, but we haven't managed to do this yet.

> 2.It is said online that Orbeon supports part of XForms 1.1. Can you list
> what those are?

I am not sure we have the whole list, but for a start we have this:

   http://www.orbeon.com/ops/doc/reference-xforms-2#xforms11-extensions
The documentation is the code ;-)

The procedure is simple: get the code from CVS, make changes / ask
questions in this mailing-list, and tell us about the results in this
mailing-list as well.

-Erik

--
Orbeon Forms - Web Forms for the Enterprise Done the Right Way
http://www.orbeon.com/



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In your answer about standard spec, can you give me some specific
explanation about meaning by "some holes"?
Plus, are there any work around to support standard spec of XForms 1.0?

Thanks,
Kay

-----Original Message-----
From: Erik Bruchez [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Erik Bruchez
Sent: Thursday, September 20, 2007 8:05 PM
To: [hidden email]
Subject: Re: [ops-users] integration

Kay Hye Kyeong You wrote:
> Hi Alex,
>
> It was nice to talk with you earlier with regards to integration.
>
> I have another question with the level of standard as below:
>
> 1.Does the Orbeon Forms fully support all standard spec of XForms 1.0?

No, we have some holes. We have a long-standing action item to clearly
document what is supported and not, but we haven't managed to do this yet.

> 2.It is said online that Orbeon supports part of XForms 1.1. Can you
> list what those are?

I am not sure we have the whole list, but for a start we have this:

   http://www.orbeon.com/ops/doc/reference-xforms-2#xforms11-extensions

> 3.Our product not only supports the standard of XForm 1.0 spec but
> also has non-standard controls implemented.
>   In the sense, we need to modify/add source code to comply with our
> nonstandard.
>   I assume if we know java code and orbeon code structure very well,
> it will be easy to extend the engine.
>   However, is there standardized ways to do so? If so, please let me
> know the big procedures.
>   If not, how much efforts are needed to dig into the orbeon's source
codes?
> How well documentated?

The documentation is the code ;-)

The procedure is simple: get the code from CVS, make changes / ask questions
in this mailing-list, and tell us about the results in this mailing-list as
well.

-Erik

--
Orbeon Forms - Web Forms for the Enterprise Done the Right Way
http://www.orbeon.com/




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In your answer about standard spec, can you give me some specific
explanation about meaning by "some holes"?
Plus, are there any work around to support standard spec of XForms 1.0?

Thanks,
Kay

-----Original Message-----
From: Erik Bruchez [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Erik Bruchez
Sent: Thursday, September 20, 2007 8:05 PM
To: [hidden email]
Subject: Re: [ops-users] integration

Kay Hye Kyeong You wrote:
> Hi Alex,
>
> It was nice to talk with you earlier with regards to integration.
>
> I have another question with the level of standard as below:
>
> 1.Does the Orbeon Forms fully support all standard spec of XForms 1.0?

No, we have some holes. We have a long-standing action item to clearly
document what is supported and not, but we haven't managed to do this yet.

> 2.It is said online that Orbeon supports part of XForms 1.1. Can you
> list what those are?

I am not sure we have the whole list, but for a start we have this:

   http://www.orbeon.com/ops/doc/reference-xforms-2#xforms11-extensions

> 3.Our product not only supports the standard of XForm 1.0 spec but
> also has non-standard controls implemented.
>   In the sense, we need to modify/add source code to comply with our
> nonstandard.
>   I assume if we know java code and orbeon code structure very well,
> it will be easy to extend the engine.
>   However, is there standardized ways to do so? If so, please let me
> know the big procedures.
>   If not, how much efforts are needed to dig into the orbeon's source
codes?
> How well documentated?

The documentation is the code ;-)

The procedure is simple: get the code from CVS, make changes / ask questions
in this mailing-list, and tell us about the results in this mailing-list as
well.

-Erik

--
Orbeon Forms - Web Forms for the Enterprise Done the Right Way
http://www.orbeon.com/




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Kay Hye Kyeong You wrote:
> In your answer about standard spec, can you give me some specific
> explanation about meaning by "some holes"?

As I said the complete list of supported XForms 1.0 and XForms 1.1
features is not available. But let's pick a few examples of missing
features I can think of right away:

* Inline (i.e. embedded in the model) XML schemas
* xforms:copy
* xforms:reset

> Plus, are there any work around to support standard spec of XForms 1.0?

Yes, implement the features and contribute them or sponsor us to
implement them ;-)

-Erik

--
Orbeon Forms - Web Forms for the Enterprise Done the Right Way
http://www.orbeon.com/


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Erik Bruchez wrote: Now that I sent this I am wondering if you mean "workaround the missing
features" or "work on the missing features". I thought I would mention
that we definitely would like to support all of XForms 1.0 and XForms
1.1. It is mainly a question of time and resources, which is why
contributions and sponsoring are likely to help.

-Erik

--
Orbeon Forms - Web Forms for the Enterprise Done the Right Way
http://www.orbeon.com/


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