Basic

What is an External Objects ?

It is an object that allows for customized interactions and behaviors within Simplicité. They are objects that you will implement to serve specific needs.

In such objects you will be able to interact with Simplicité by using the Ajax Library to properly interact with the native part of your solution.

There are several types of External Objects, that all serve a certain use-case of type of need:

• Basic
• UI page or component
• Web-page
• JQuery web page
• Static web site
• REST web service
• Mapped REST web service
• GraphQL web service
• PDF document
• Excel document

We highly recommend you to choose the adapted nature for your external object in order to ensure its proper integration and workflow.

The most used are:

• Basic: to create all type of elements, but mostly to handle external objects that should be accessible both in public & private zones (outside or inside of Simplicité's interfaces).
• UI page or component: to create widgets that can be embedded in any Dashboard or any View.
• Web-page: to create components rendered exclusively in the public zone as standalone pages still interacting dynamically with a Simplicité's instance.
• Static web site: to create standalone webpages that are not interacting with any Simplicité's instance.

Structure

All External Objects are organized as web elements, thus are composed of 3 resources:

• HTML is the resource containing the html code of your object that defines its core structure and organization.
• STYLES is the resource containing the stylesheet (css or less) associated with your object's HTML.
• CLASS is the resource with the javascript file inside of which you will code the behaviors and interactions for your External Object.

And in addition, all external objects works with a Java Class that ensures both their proper setup, and the rendering of the web resources.

The Basic nature refers directly to the mother class com.simplicite.util.ExternalObject while each one of the other mentioned Nature above refers to a specific class in the com.simplicite.webapp package:

Nature	Java Class
UI page or component	web.ResponsiveExternalObject
Web-page	web.WebPageExternalObject
JQuery web page	web.JQueryWebPage
Static web site	web.StaticSiteExternalObject
REST web service	services.RESTServiceExternalObject
Mapped REST web service	services.RESTMappedObjectsExternalObject
GraphQL web service	services.GraphQLExternalObject
PDF document	documents.PDFDocumentExternalObject
Excel document	documents.ExcelDocumentExternalObject

How to create

1. Go to the User Interface > External objects > Show all menu

2. Click Create in the panel's header.

3. Properly fill the Create External object form:

   • Code for your external object's name.
   • Nature shall be Basic.
   • Module Name for the module containing your external object.
   • UI Widget to Yes if your object can be added to a dashboard and No otherwise.

   Example values:

4. Click Save.

5. Click Create Resources to create the web-resources (html|css|js) for your object.

6. (optional) Click Edit Code to generate the custom java class for your object.

   Default java code

   package com.simplicite.extobjects.Training;
   
   import java.util.*;
   
   import com.simplicite.util.*;
   import com.simplicite.util.exceptions.*;
   import com.simplicite.util.tools.*;
   
   /**
    * Basic external object TrnExternalObject
    */
   public class TrnExternalObject extends com.simplicite.util.ExternalObject {
       private static final long serialVersionUID = 1L;
   
       // Note: instead of this basic external object, a specialized subclass should be used
   
       /**
        * Display method
        * @param params Request parameters
        */
       @Override
       public Object display(Parameters params) {
           try {
               // Call the render Javascript method implemented in the SCRIPT resource
               // ctn is the "div.extern-content" to fill on UI
               return javascript(getName() + ".render(ctn);");
           }
           catch (Exception e) {
               AppLog.error(null, e, getGrant());
               return e.getMessage();
           }
       }
   }

7. Click Save and your object is ready to be implemented.

Configuration

Field	Description
Code	External Object's unique identifier
Nature	Type of the External Object, here UI page or component
Source Code	Java code for customized server-side behaviors
Class	Extended class for the Java code, here com.simplicite.webapp.web.ResponsiveExternalObject
Icon	External Object's logo
UI Widget	Indicates if this element shall be considered as a Widget or not.

Read More

Tips & Advices

• Javascript Development.
• Ajax Library.

Details & Specificities

• Web Pages with "Basic" Nature.
• Code examples for "UI component" (walkthrough).