ZK-DL Released!

ZK-DL, an extension to the ZKoss framework (ZK 5), has been released under LGPL just a few weeks ago!. ZK_DL provides especially:

1. Integration with Spring.
2. Flexible listbox, combobox and lovbox (a kind of combobox) components with automatic sorting and searching build upon the Hibernate Criteria API.
3. And much more, see http://zk.datalite.cz/zk-dl.

The documentation is at http://zk.datalite.cz/zk-dl and the source code can be found at http://code.google.com/p/zk-dl/.

I have used DL-ZK with EJB3 on JBoss 5.1 successfully. So I had not taken the advantage of ZK-DL Spring integration (IMHO better than original ZK Spring integration). Anyway the ZK-DL listobox, combobox and lovbox components has greatly simplified our development and provided a rich yet simple interface to our users.

Many thanks to Jiří Bubník and Karel Čemus for their valuable help and cooperation. I wish DL-ZK long life and have many users!

ZK and Converting to a Negative Number

When I was working with ZK Web Framework, I have needed to convert some number to the negatives for the databinding. I have created a new type converter NumberNegativeConverter. Hope, someone else may find it useful, see http://sites.google.com/site/xmedeko/code/zk-web-framework/numbernegativeconverter.

ZK Calendar Colors

Unfortunately, colours for the ZK Calendar has to be specified in the Java. They cannot be set in a CSS file. Because writing hexadecimal colour codes directly in the code is error prone, I have created a simple enum constant with a set of ZK Calendar colors:

public enum ZkCalendarsColor  {
 GREY("#B4BAB7", "#72706F"),
 GREEN("#4CB052", "#0D7813"),
 KHAKI("#BFBF4D", "#88880E"),
 PURPLE("#B373B3", "#7A367A"),
 RED("#D96666", "#A32929"),
 BLUE("#668CD9", "#3467CE");
 
 private String contentColor;
 private String headerColor;
 
 private ZkCalendarsColor(String contentColor, String headerColor) {
  this.contentColor = contentColor;
  this.headerColor = headerColor;
 }

 public String getContentColor() {
  return contentColor;
 }

 public String getHeaderColor() {
  return headerColor;
 }
}

ZK 3.6 CSRF Protection

Unfortunately, ZK Web Framework version 3.6 and earlier lack any CSRF protection. i have created a very basic event filter to tackle this issue. Hope, someone else may find it useful, see http://sites.google.com/site/xmedeko/code/zk-web-framework/zk-3-6-csrf-protection. It is just a very first version, leave me a comment, if you have some suggestion.

Update 15th Sep 2010: Improved protection and logging.

ZK - Converting Null Values

A common problem in database programming is to display some meaningful labels instead of NULL values in the list of database rows. Fortunately, ZK Web Framework, offers a comfortable TypeConverter class to address this issue. I have created a general type converter NullToLabelConverter to convert NULL values into any localised text. Hope, someone else may find it useful, see http://sites.google.com/site/xmedeko/code/zk-web-framework/nulltolabelconverter.

ZK Logging in ZUL zscript Code

I have created a very simple class to simplify getting Java logger for the ZUL file (see ZK Web Framework). It is targeted especially for the JBoss logging org.jboss.logging.Logger, but can be easily changed for java.util.logging or any other logging library. Hope, someone else may find it useful, see http://sites.google.com/site/xmedeko/code/zk-web-framework/zul-logging.

ZK and Very Long Strings

When I was working with ZK Web Framework, I have needed to display just a beginning of a very long String in a listbox. I have created a new type converter StringTrimConverter, which trims a string to the specified length. Hope, someone else may find it useful, see http://sites.google.com/site/xmedeko/code/zk-web-framework/stringtrimconverter.