Java Step by Step

In the second of this two-article series, we implement relational database storage for the object-storing framework we developed last time. We then specialize it to support the open source MySQL database. Next, we plug the MySQL...

In this first of two articles, we look at implementing an object database frontend -- that is to say, a database frontend that can automatically map between Java objects and records within a relational database. Using this frontend...

In this article, Merlin takes you through the process of implementing a simple, multicast-based, peer-to-peer chat system. To make things more interesting, he'll show you how to implement two custom stream classes that simplify the...

This installment of Java Step By Step focuses on adding print functionality to a Swing application. Michael begins by covering the fundamentals of the new Java 2 printing system and its mechanisms. He then steps through the addition...

JDK 1.1 introduced character streams to Java quite a while ago, nicely addressing the basic need for Java to be able to properly read and write character-based data and to properly decode a wide variety of byte encodings of a large...

This second article in a two-part series demonstrates how to add event handling and networking to the newly resurfaced Swing Forum client. Michael begins by examining the JTree component, which facilitates user interaction in the...

JDK 1.2 is already in its fourth beta release, gathering steam for its full release sometime this fall. One of its key features is the now fully integrated JFC, which, with its Swing GUI library, will revolutionize Java GUI design and...

In this second look at 3D graphics programming in Java, Merlin takes you through rendering 3D terrains. He'll step through the problem from the ground up, working through lots of fun mathematics and algorithms along the way. You may...

Enterprise JavaBeans gives us the perfect excuse to revisit our Forum application. EJB's ability to handle messy infrastructure issues will help us quickly replace the current RMI backend with a session bean that provides the same...

This month, Step by Step columnist Merlin Hughes takes a slight change of direction, with a look at computer graphics programming. Specifically, he'll step you through the process of drawing textured spheres. Along the way you'll...

In honor of Mother's Day, we're devoting this entire column to MOM -- message-oriented middleware, that is. This article investigates what makes MOM systems tick and how they relate to RPC-oriented systems such as RMI. Step by Step...

The Internet can be a lonely place: lots of people, surfing the same Web sites at the same time, without ever getting to know each other. In this month's installment of Step by Step, we'll work to inject some community into the...

Our last tango with our shared whiteboard app illustrated how to use servlets to implement a communications layer. This month we're going to move the communications layer to CORBA. CORBA provides a lot of flexibility and power to...

Graphical applications programming has been greatly simplified with the advent of JDK 1.1. Specifically, the lightweight component framework allows transparent tools to be overlaid on each other, and the delegation event framework...

When we last left our handy Forum application, it consisted of a Java client applet, a Java middleware layer, and a Microsoft SQL Server database. The client and middleware layer communicated via sockets, and the middleware layer and...

JavaBeans: visual, reusable software components. We can rebuild them. We have the technology. We can make them better than before -- better, stronger, faster. More powerful than any bean alive -- the six-million dollar JavaBean. Well,...

JavaBeans has ushered Java into a whole new era. Not only does it provide a rapid application development (RAD) environment, but it also offers a general framework for the development of reusable code libraries. And reusability is...

Without graphs to visually describe data, we'd be stuck in board rooms listening to CFOs verbally describe the upcoming fiscal year. I don't know about you, but looking at a graph that covers the same information in a much more...

The Forum application that we created earlier this year is a pretty nifty bulletin-board system, but it needs some work if we want to make it a production-grade application. This month, we'll develop a JDBC communications layer that...

JDK 1.1 brings a host of additions, alterations, and deprecations to the somewhat sedentary API of JDK 1.0.2. Perhaps the most significant of these changes is the new delegation event model of the Abstract Windowing Toolkit and its...