# RoR vs JavaScript/AJAX vs Java interface. Conflicting ideas? **URL:** \ **Category:** Rails\ **Created:** [February 16, 2006, 6:02pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/ror-vs-javascript-ajax-vs-java-interface-conflicting-ideas/69304 "2006-02-16T18:02:26Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![dracos](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/d/ea666f/32.png) [@dracos](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/dracos)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2006, 6:02pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/ror-vs-javascript-ajax-vs-java-interface-conflicting-ideas/69304/1 "2006-02-16T18:02:26Z")
Hi, Over the past month I’ve been playing with some ideas for an admin interface for a ecommerce app. 1. Old-fashioned, forms-based, full-page-refresh, server-focused interface 2. Modern, JavaScript-Drag-Drop, AJAX, client-focused, Web2.0 interface The more I work on the second option with JavaScript an AJAX the more I feel like I’m moving away from building a server side application that takes advantage of all the great things that Rails provides developers for the interface: all those nice simple rhtml templates, easy form validation error messages, etc. I feel like I’m developing a client JavaScript application that talks to the server Rails app. That’s fine and sounds ok but is it really the best option? Right now I’m convinced I want to use Rails for the server side but is JavaScript the best option for the client side? More requirements could be placed on the computer where the admin interface is used than the storefront for shoppers. I’ve been reading about Java Web Start applications. It might be easier to build a big admin application with Java given all the mature GUI libraries that exist for Java compared to those that exist for JavaScript. And this would save some server time and make a snappy interface for the admin user. Could Rails be easily used to talk with a client Java application? Am I crazy? Thanks, Peter ---
**Author:** ![dracos](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/d/ea666f/32.png) [@dracos](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/dracos)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2006, 8:00pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/ror-vs-javascript-ajax-vs-java-interface-conflicting-ideas/69304/2 "2006-02-16T20:00:26Z")
> Could Rails be easily used to talk with a client Java application? A Java Web Start client application using SOAP web services to comunicate with Rails server app? ---
**Author:** ![dracos](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/d/ea666f/32.png) [@dracos](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/dracos)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2006, 9:28pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/ror-vs-javascript-ajax-vs-java-interface-conflicting-ideas/69304/3 "2006-02-16T21:28:08Z")
> Am I crazy? “Yes.” ---
**Author:** ![dracos](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/d/ea666f/32.png) [@dracos](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/dracos)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2006, 7:08pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/ror-vs-javascript-ajax-vs-java-interface-conflicting-ideas/69304/4 "2006-02-18T19:08:51Z")
> Am I crazy? > > Thanks, > Peter > > * * * > > Rails mailing list > removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid > [http://lists.rubyonrails.org/mailman/listinfo/rails](http://lists.rubyonrails.org/mailman/listinfo/rails) I know how you feel, Peter. There is a huge impedence mismatch in web development as soon as you start to try to take advantage of the environment that you are working in. You have to know, on the server side SQL (if you want to do anything more advanced than your ORM is allowing) and Ruby and the Rails framework. Then, on the client side, you have to worry about html, javascript, css, etc. There are no good solutions for debugging through the entire stack, say from a javascript click event, through the XmlHttpRequest onto the server rails logic, into the, say, stored procedure, and all the way back down the stack to the html client. On top of all of that, you are giving up a lot of the benefits of the powerful desktops we have. In five years, when we have 8 CPUs and, perhaps, two terabytes of hard drive space on a CPU, is all of that power really being used usefully inside of a browser interface? After working on web apps for almost a decade, it really is a joy to be working on desktop apps that interface with servers via web services. Robert ---
**Author:** ![dracos](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/d/ea666f/32.png) [@dracos](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/dracos)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2006, 7:24pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/ror-vs-javascript-ajax-vs-java-interface-conflicting-ideas/69304/5 "2006-02-18T19:24:02Z")
> Karl > > * * * > > Rails mailing list > removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid > [http://lists.rubyonrails.org/mailman/listinfo/rails](http://lists.rubyonrails.org/mailman/listinfo/rails) There are lots of great desktop java apps that can be provided as counterexamples. Ruby will need to support native threading before it is able to compete on the desktop, really. But I guess a lot of this is really off topic. ---
**Author:** ![dracos](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/d/ea666f/32.png) [@dracos](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/dracos)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2006, 7:17pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/ror-vs-javascript-ajax-vs-java-interface-conflicting-ideas/69304/6 "2006-02-18T19:17:57Z")
If you need to go for Java-Webstart, you should have very very strong reasons for this. Usually you are much better of if you can avoid it. Try to do your app with HTML and very little JavaScript. If that’s not enough, use more JavaScript. If that’s not enough, consider Ajax. If that’s really not enough, consider Flash. Try to avoid Java on the client side. If you build a public web-application that is to be used by 100 or more clients around the web, that are not under your control, do not go for Java Webstart. It is really a pain to get it running on a messed up Windows-98-box with Internet-Explorer, some mess in the registry and some mess in the DLLs already around. With a couple of clients you can do it on the phone and visit the most difficult ones personally. But **unfortunately** the policy of a software vending company to disable java on the client has pretty much succeeded. So don’t fight the wind mills. So let’s assume you install the Java-Webstart application for the intranet and you have some control over the Client-machines, to make sure they have the right java-stuff installed and working. Now the next issue comes into the picture. Developing with Java-Swing is quite a pain. It is very powerful, very general and very strong. But you have to do a lot of work to get it going. Usually it’s not worth it. Unless you need it, which is sometimes the case. And now, if you are interfacing java with java, it still does not work too well, but the communication is more powerful than communition between java and ruby. So with ruby on the server, it makes even less sense. I have some hope that Ruby/Tk, Ruby/Gtk, RubyFX or Ruby/Qt will be able to provide a good cross platform GUI-development toolset in the long run, to replace JavaSwing. That could be great. Java is not good for applets or GUI-Applications, it is more for server side development. But you can still rely on Java, if you want to have cross-platform GUIs, at a price. Best regards Karl ---
**Author:** ![dracos](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/d/ea666f/32.png) [@dracos](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/dracos)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2006, 8:00pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/ror-vs-javascript-ajax-vs-java-interface-conflicting-ideas/69304/7 "2006-02-18T20:00:20Z")
Hi Robert, Thanks for the great reply. I’ve been reading a lot about Java over the last few days and am starting to feel like, that at least for website admin side of things, building a desktop app will be way more powerful than using a browser. Now I’m wondering about how to communicate with the server and what to layer on top of the database program. Also where does the ORM go and how to insure bad data is not allowed into the database. One options is to use Rails and web services via SOAP on the server. Do you think that is the best? Seems to me like this would require duplicating the model definitions on the server and client so that when a serialized object arrives at the client, the object can be reconstituted. Programming the models in Ruby for the server and Java for the client seems rediculous. Another option would be to write a specialized server app to sit on top of the database and communicate via some other protocol. This makes me think that a pure java solution might be the best way to go. I’m still investigating options so any more advice about ways to go would be greatly appreciated. Net technology. So many options! Thanks, Peter ---
**Author:** ![dracos](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/d/ea666f/32.png) [@dracos](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/dracos)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2006, 11:26pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/ror-vs-javascript-ajax-vs-java-interface-conflicting-ideas/69304/8 "2006-02-18T23:26:48Z")
Hey Peter, If you are interested in writing a strong cross platform client side app, then maybe download netbeans and give it a shot. It seems like a very easy to learn and use IDE. Alternatively you could give eclipse a try too, but it seems to have a bit higher of a learning curve. On the server side, why not give Ruby a try? There are some very nice soap libraries that you can use, along with ActiveRecord from rails… I think that’d make it pretty easy to get something going.