Teresa Lau

Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP) is fast becoming a de facto access method for common directory information. XML is now the standard for data exchange on the Web. The relational database, a technology for modeling data in table form, has always been the most popular way to store and retrieve application data. How do these three technologies come together, other than the fact that they're all buzzwords in the technology world? They're all a way to represent data, which you can easily access using the powerful set of query capabilities they each provide. LDAP data can be queried using LDAP directory search, XML data can be queried using XPath, and relational database data can be queried using SQL. In this article I describe an Employee Information Application that can use all three methods to store and query data. You'll learn how to construct each kind ... (more)

Java Data Object

Java Data Object (JDO) is a standard API generically used to store, retrieve, and query user-written object classes to and from a data store. What makes JDO stand out among other persistence options is that it's easy to use and flexible. JDO provides transparent persistence so it's easy for developers to persist objects without doing any extra work. The tedious and routine persistence work is offloaded to the JDO vendor, leaving developers with time to concentrate on the business logic. In addition, JDO is flexible because it can work on any data store. While JDBC provides persis... (more)

A List Tool for All Applications

How often do you find yourself copying and pasting old code when developing GUIs that are similar to others you've developed? Many times I find that if I do that more than once or twice on some code, it's worthwhile to make a component out of it for the benefits of reuse and highly maintainable code. The initial overhead for creating a component is high, but it will pay off if you design it well, making it useful for other occasions. The better you design it, the more likely you'll use it in the future and the more benefits you'll get. ListPanel and ListTabPanel are two reusable ... (more)