Looking for confirmation

HightowerC

Hello all,
I'm just looking for confirmation that the following is horrible
application design.

We have an application (web-based) that contains a JSP which contains
an applet which calls some VBScript which activates an ActiveX control
which kicks off a TWAIN driver for scanning.

Needless to say, the above is very fragile. The slightest change on
the client machine(machine which accesses the JSP/applet) or the
server (running Apache Tomcat 5.0) causes the appliation to fail.

Does anyone have any ideas on how to simplify the above system?

HightowerC

P.S. Don't blame me for the above program design. I inherited it from
other programmers.

Daniel Pitts

HightowerC wrote:
> Hello all,
> I'm just looking for confirmation that the following is horrible
> application design.
>
> We have an application (web-based) that contains a JSP which contains
> an applet which calls some VBScript which activates an ActiveX control
> which kicks off a TWAIN driver for scanning.
>
> Needless to say, the above is very fragile. The slightest change on
> the client machine(machine which accesses the JSP/applet) or the
> server (running Apache Tomcat 5.0) causes the appliation to fail.
>
> Does anyone have any ideas on how to simplify the above system?
>
> HightowerC
>
> P.S. Don't blame me for the above program design. I inherited it from
> other programmers.
My suggestion. Consolidate as much as possible into one language. If
you're using ActiveX to handle the TWAIN drivers, my suggestion is on
the client side use ActiveX exclusively. As for the rest of it, the JSP
should be fine.

--
Daniel Pitts' Tech Blog: <http://virtualinfinity.net/wordpress/>

Andrew Thompson

HightowerC wrote:
...
>I'm just looking for confirmation that the following is horrible
>application design.
>
>We have an application (web-based) that contains a JSP which contains
>an applet ...

You can stop right there. Applets embedded in web pages
are subject to a new bug 'every other month'*. They are high
maintenance, and therefore (in my perspective) bad design.

* Though "applets embeded in web pages that interact with.."
might raise that to "a new bug every other week".

--
Andrew Thompson
http://www.physci.org/

Message posted via JavaKB.com
http://www.javakb.com/Uwe/Forums.asp...neral/200712/1

Kenneth P. Turvey

On Sat, 08 Dec 2007 02:21:59 +0000, Andrew Thompson wrote:

[Snip]
> You can stop right there. Applets embedded in web pages
> are subject to a new bug 'every other month'*. They are high
> maintenance, and therefore (in my perspective) bad design.
[Snip]

OK, I'll bite. Why are applets prone to more bugs than other Java
applications?

--
Kenneth P. Turvey <kt-usenet@squeakydolphin.com>

Lew

Kenneth P. Turvey wrote:
> On Sat, 08 Dec 2007 02:21:59 +0000, Andrew Thompson wrote:
>
> [Snip]
>> You can stop right there. Applets embedded in web pages
>> are subject to a new bug 'every other month'*. They are high
>> maintenance, and therefore (in my perspective) bad design.
> [Snip]
>
> OK, I'll bite. Why are applets prone to more bugs than other Java
> applications?

Short version - because browsers are so widely variant in their support for
applets. Sometimes "support for applets" is at best a vague hand wave and a hope.

--
Lew

Andrew Thompson

Lew wrote:
>> [Snip]
>>> You can stop right there. Applets embedded in web pages
>[quoted text clipped - 4 lines]
>> OK, I'll bite. Why are applets prone to more bugs than other Java
>> applications?
>
>Short version - because browsers are so widely variant in their support for
>applets. Sometimes "support for applets" is at best a vague hand wave and a hope.

Yes.

OTOH - Launching applets via web start removes a lot of that
'browser variance', but makes little sense, since a JWS launched
applet can no longer interact with JS, or other applets.
Once you go to web start, you might as well look directly to
(J)Frames, which can at least be resized (more easily).

--
Andrew Thompson
http://www.physci.org/

Message posted via http://www.javakb.com