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Overview

JIDE Software products can be divided into two major categories - component category and solution category.

Component Category

Under the component category, we further divide into three sub-categories - framework products, generic component products and special component products.

Framework products include the JIDE Docking Framework and the JIDE Action Framework. They are called framework products because the user can use them to create an application skeleton or framework. With these two framework products, you can easily create an application framework that can be used in your own application or used by different groups within the same company. This framework concept sounds different from other client framework products/projects which leverage xml to build an application. However there is no conflict. From a Model-View-Controller (aka MVC) design pattern point of view, those frameworks are part of the model and control layers, whereas our framework products are currently part of the view layer. In the future, we will either extend our framework product to cover the model and control layer, or integrate with leading client frameworks, to provide a complete framework solution.

Generic component products include the JIDE Common Layer, the JIDE Components, the JIDE Grids and the JIDE Dialogs. They contain all kinds of individual components. Usually each component product has its focus. JIDE Grids, as the name indicated, is focused on components or utility classes related to the JTable, such as different types of JTables, cell editors, cell renderers etc. JIDE Dialogs includes components such as wizards, option dialogs, and tip of the day dialogs. JIDE Components, although containing the most number of components, does not focus on one particular area. The idea is to let JIDE Components include any component which doesn't belong to a particular product. These components may be split off into new products as the need arises.

Special component products currently include the JIDE Shortcut Editor, JIDE Pivot Grid, JIDE Data Grids, JIDE Code Editor, JIDE Feed Reader, JIDE Dashboard, JIDE Charts and JIDE Gantt Chart. We will introduce more in the future. These products are usually built on top of generic component products. They differ from generic component products by focusing on a particular feature.

Solution Category

Solution products currently include the JIDE Desktop Application Framework.  The JIDE Desktop Application Framework (JDAF) is a foundation for developing truly cross-platform desktop applications in Java. JDAF provides industry first concepts such as a Managed Application UI which provides an OS Guidelines-driven application host. From the developers perspective, the UI is managed, so all you need to do is create content and let the services of the framework manage windows, dialogs, menus, and toolbars. An MVC architecture facilitates UI and Data binding. From the users point of view, they will experience an application that feels native and intuitive on their platform because we've taken the next step in Look and Feel fidelity by addressing the application experience portion of OS guidelines specifications. And like Swing, you get this for free just by using the framework. JDAF also includes a console application API which facilitates making command-line applications a snap. This product also provides us a platform from which to release new and more specialized types of application frameworks and add-ons in the future. You can read the product page for the list of features.