gel Files

gel - Generic Layer Framework for Java Applications
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The gel framework provides tools for several functionality purposes in Java (client and server) applications. These tools make the code smaller and simpler by implementing solutions for common functionality and design patterns, mostly related to GUI effects, multithreading and configurability.
The framework contains several components that might be used separately according to dependancies.

Developer:
Gene Marin - em88il@gmail.com.

License:
GPLv3 - applied to all files recieved with this archive.

    Copyright (C) 2014, Gene Marin

    gel is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify
    it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
    the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or
    (at your option) any later version.

    gel is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
    but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
    MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.  See the
    GNU General Public License for more details.

    You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
    along with gel.  If not, see <http://www.gnu.org/licenses/>.

Verision:
1.2.3

Framework components:
- Basic (gel.basic) - basic tools.
- DMT (gel.dmt) - stands for 'dense multithreading', provides tools for managing processes in complicated multi-threaded programs (handling races, queues, retries, critical operations and more).
- IO (gel.io) - tools for working with files and other IO streams.
- GUI (gel.gui) - tools for GUI managing and animations engine.
- SWAT (gel.swat) - tools for SWT applications (managing resources, animations implementation for SWT and more).
All components require JRE 7.


gel.basic
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Component contains basic utils and constants. Constitutes the basic dependancy for the other gel components.

Dependancies:
- Apache commons-lang


gel.dmt
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Component contains tools for managing and logging processes, and their data and resources in complicated multi-threaded programs. dmt provides synchronization tools and event-driven programming based design patterns implementation.
DMTManager is the main manager of the component data and resources, and must be shut down before exit.
DMTModule is an optional class to implement a heirarchial modules tree for management of processes. There must be at most one 'top module' if implementing a modules tree.

Usage rules:
- Declare methods as @HeavyMethod if they meet it's definition.
- Any method calling a heavy method is also heavy.*
- If using DMTModules, DMTManager must not be shut down manually anywhere.
- If using DMTModules, dmt objects and methods must not be used out of the top module after it's runtime, unless noted otherwise.
* An exception might be "potential" heavy methods implemented as light.

Tips:
- Messing with task matrixes is easier with async tasks binding.
- Task matrixes and other complex shutdownables better be shut down directly before DMTManager.

Dependancies:
- gel.basic
- Apache commons-lang


gel.io
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Component contains tools for working with files and other IO streams.
IOManager is the main manager of the component data and resources.

Dependancies:
- gel.basic
- gel.dmt
- Apache commons-lang
- XStream


gel.gui
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Component contains tools and features for GUI applications, and a simple animation engine.

Usage rules:
- Declare methods as @GUIMethod if they meet it's definition.
- GUI methods must not call any heavy methods synchronously.*
- Heavy methods are never GUI methods.*
- GUI resources added to resources set must not be disposed manually.
* An exception might be "potential" heavy methods implemented as GUI.

Dependancies:
- gel.basic
- gel.dmt
- Apache commons-lang


gel.swat
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Component contains tools for advanced SWT application managing, animations implementation and a small widgets toolkit.
SWTManager is the main manager of the SWT resources and utils.

Tips:
- SWT animations work best in maximized or full-screen applications, since a mouse movement in and out of the application GUI objects causes the animations to slow down and accelerate.

Dependancies:
- gel.basic
- gel.dmt
- gel.gui
- Apache commons-lang
- SWT


Versions history
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1.2:
- Separated SWAT from GUI.
- Created GUI tools.
- Created SWAT widgets.
- Created list property.

1.1:
- Separated SWT implementation from generic animations engine.

1.0:
- First version.