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koosala
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Handling Lane on the client side
May 13th, 2007 at 11:07am
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Hi,

I have two questions in fact, so the subject I have written deals with the more important of the two.

1. How different are the different products that you supply.
I am currently seriously evaluating NetDiagram to be integrated into our product. I was looking at a diagramming tool that can be programmed against on the server side in ASP.NET and also on the client side in Javascript. It should also provide good user experience. NetDiagram seems to do that because you provide a Java applet that can be worked against on the server side in .NET and in JavaScript on the client side.
My question here is - Is NetDiagram sort of best of the breed of the products that you offer, or should I also be looking at Flowchart.Net, JDiagram (which you supply explicitly) or the others also?

2. Boxes and arrows can be manipulated on the client side. Why aren't you allowing for lanes to be manipulated (for example adding, moving around, etc) from JavaScript the same way? The Programmer reference that came along with the evaluation version does not talk at all or provide any API reference to the Java applet that can be used on the client side. This is a feature that I was really looking forward to.
Any information for this question of mine will be very useful.

Thanks,
Praveen
  
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Stoyo
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Re: Handling Lane on the client side
Reply #1 - May 14th, 2007 at 6:45am
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Hi,

1. NetDiagram is the best solution if you need diagramming in a web application. We have just released its first version and it still lags in some features compared to the Windows Forms control, mostly import and export functionality. Our developers are currently porting most of the missing features, and they will be available in the next NetDiagram release.

2. Lanes were introduced in the last Flowchart.NET version - 4.3, and we haven't ported them to Java yet, so currently they are only available on the server side when using the ImageMap mode. For the time being you can emulate lanes on the client side by creating rectangular locked boxes in the background; the second screen in the JDiagram demo shows that approach -

https://mindfusion.eu/JDiagramTrial.zip

I hope that helps,
Stoyan
  
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koosala
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Re: Handling Lane on the client side
Reply #2 - May 14th, 2007 at 11:38am
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Hi Stoyan,

Thanks for your reply.

I tried running JDiagDemo from the link you have given, and I got an exception saying ....flowchart.jds(The system cannot find the path specified). Every other example worked, though.

From the samples, it looks like the JDiagram.jar provides generic drawing functionality and the other java files you included (whose source you have given me) act as the application around this jar file.

Now, my question is, can I extend the NetDiagram applet you provide to include some other Java code, like in your example or am I limited to scripting around the flowchart applet using JavaScript only (because coding in a structured environment over JavaScript is always preferable)?

Also, there are many methods in NetDiagram Java API that expect instances of some other classes. For example flowChart.getNodeAt(Point2D.Float) expects a Point. How do I supply a Point2D (or any other base Java class for that matter) from JavaScript?
  
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Stoyo
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Re: Handling Lane on the client side
Reply #3 - May 14th, 2007 at 12:27pm
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Hi Praveen,

Did you start the JDiagDemo using the "run.bat" file?

You could unzip the JDiagram.jar file, add your own classes to the folder, and create a new jar. Then set a different JarLocation value corresponding to the name of your jar file.

The ScriptHelper class provides some helper methods that you can use to create Java class instances. However we haven't yet added a method to create a Point. We can add one and upload the updated jar here in a couple of days.

Stoyan
  
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koosala
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Re: Handling Lane on the client side
Reply #4 - May 15th, 2007 at 12:25am
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Hello Stoyan,

I am sorry my questions are getting lengthy and frequent, but I have found this to be the best way to make expedited decisions.

I could get the JDiagDemo application to work as well, including it into an eclipse project.

Now, the point you mentioned below about extending ScriptHelper is interesting because I will then be dependant on you to provide access to any new classes. I think I will have an easier time if I am able to extend the applet around the JDiagram.jar that is used in NetDiagram. So, reiterating my earlier question, is it possible to add some more Java files, make that into a Jar, which could become the applet (like in your samples you created a frame based app around JDiagram) around JDiagram? This should be used as a part of NetDiagram.

Thanks,
Praveen
  
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koosala
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Re: Handling Lane on the client side
Reply #5 - May 15th, 2007 at 4:10am
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Hi,

I think I should be more specific with my question here (as an extension to my previous post). Let me explain the scenario.

I am testing NetDiagram in a .Net project. So, I incuded the flowchart component into my page. This component outputs html code on the client side which looks somewhat like this:

MindFusion.setInnerHtml('diagram', '<applet name=\'diagram\' id=\'diagram\' code=\'com/mindfusion/jdiagram/FlowChartApplet.class\' archive=\'JDiagram.jar\'

So, what it looks to me is that FlowChartApplet.class is the applet which has the init method which would have a flowchart control added to it.

Now, if I want my class to handle events, I can add it to the jar file alright, but I will also need the FlowChartApplet.class to create instances of my class.

So, the alternatives here are

1. I would need to have the source to FlowChartApplet.class, so I can change it.

2. The NetDiagram.dll (which I assume deals with the ASP.NET control) should have provision to specify some other applet so that I can put my applet in there, which can host the Java control for the FlowChart.

I prefer the latter because I would like to not touch the source of your product, but build another Jar that has a reference to the JDiagram.jar

So, can this part be customized and am I on the right track here?

Praveen
  
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Stoyo
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Re: Handling Lane on the client side
Reply #6 - May 15th, 2007 at 5:06am
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Hi,

You can create your custom jar file and set its name in the JarLocation property. At this time the applet class name is hard coded. I guess it will be useful to have some kind of AppletClassName property, we will add this to the 1.0.1 release.

Stoyan
  
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