Published on: Wednesday, September 17, 2008
By: roy.goffer
Categories: Home Page
Users have accessed this article 3331 times.
| Customer's only criticism after Chillisoft delivered on time & budget with Visual WebGui as an OEM was: “This is really going to make the rest of our application look bad….” |
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Abstract
Chillisoft is a custom software development company which provides a framework for enterprise applications over existing Microsoft Technologies. Its Habanero framework extends far beyond an ORM, addressing all the layers in traditional enterprise software development. To answer that range of complex requirements in a productive and simple form, Chillisoft chose to embed Visual WebGui.
Business needs
The Habanero framework used for developing enterprise applications is able to address the Data Access Layers, Business Logic Layer and Presentation Layer. The Data Access Layer provides the Typical ORM functionality, the Business Logic Layer provides the common functionality required to easily implementing a Rich Business Domain Model, and The Presentation Layer provides components and functionality to integrate User Interface Widgets with the Business Objects from the Domain Model.
Chillisoft develops many ASP.NET applications using their framework, but the presentation layer has always been too complex and time consuming for them to optimize. In March 2008 a development project of a fairly large high end enterprise application was about to begin. The requirements were to deliver all the advantages of the web along with high performance and obviously to deliver within the extremely tight time frames.
Therefore, the Chillisoft Habanero team looked for a simple, inexpensive and rather fast solution that can be implemented without having to perform radical modification. It was also important to find a solution which will be productive on top of providing the functional requirements for the advanced presentation layers as the schedule was tight.
The Solution
The Habanero team proposed to do a 3 week feasibility study on Visual WebGui in order to determine the use of Visual WebGui for the project, that is, using it for the Habanero framework including the Habanero Presentation layer. The existing Windows framework was copied and this proved to be easier than expected.
In addition to its strong ORM features, Habanero was designed to facilitate rapid development of the presentation layer by automatically generating sections of the user interface where the business objects are to be (CRUD) Created, Read, Updated, and Deleted.
Habanero provided a wrapping of the UI controls and adapted them to display and update properties on the Business Objects. While the framework already supported the .Net Forms controls, with the Visual WebGui controls, the framework could now be adapted to generate one application that could run in either a web or desktop environment - a truly significant achievement.
Peter Wiles of the Habanero development team said that the project we developed for our customer using WebGui and the Habanero Framework was a fantastic success with the project being delivered on time and budget. The customer was ecstatic – the only criticism and concerns raised were of the following variety: “This is really going to make the rest of our application look bad.” And “Do you know how much pressure we are going to get to get the rest of the application to look the same?”
Benefits
The decision to embed Visual WebGui in their Habanero framework allowed Chillisoft to deliver the application on schedule while fulfilling all of the customer's initial requirements of creating a high performance web application. It also enabled Chillisoft to address and overcome their presentation layer issues and release the latest version 2.0 of Habanero up to the presentation standards they sought after.
Utilizing Visual WebGui as a presentation layer engine lets Habanero inherit the VWG capability of coding once and deploying interchangeably. In the Habanero case, it means that it can be presented as a Visual WebGui web application or native .NET Windows Forms application.
The result of the combination of the Habanero framework and Visual WebGui was declared as a fantastic success, receiving enthusiastic reaction on behalf of the customers and leading Chillisoft to continue using Visual WebGui for future developments.
Screen Shots
The Habanero framework extends far beyond an ORM and in fact addresses all the layers in traditions Enterprise Software Development
For more information you can visit the Chillisoft website www.chillisoft.co.za/habanero