Check out my new article on OTN about building a Grails web application using the Oracle JDeveloper IDE.

Excerpt-
Following the Ruby on Rails (RoR) wave, most software developers have considered, if not tried out, either ROR or some other framework that promises to deliver ROR features. The Grails framework also rode the Rails wave to popularity but is now shaping into a powerful framework in its own right. Grails uses the Groovy
programming language; Groovy syntax is similar to Java’s, but it also adopts some concepts from other languages. Like Java, Groovy generates bytecodes and runs on the Java platform, so it has the power of Java but also adds a few niceties and simplifications.

In this article you will get an introduction to developing Grails applications using Oracle JDeveloper as your IDE. You will also get an overview of Groovy concepts as you go about developing your Grails application.

Visit - http://www.oracle.com/technology/pub/articles/oak-grails.html

Related -
* Groovy bridges the scripting and the enterprise Java worlds (Interview with Groovy Lead)
* Grails is a breath of fresh air for Java developers (Interview with Grails Lead)

Pleased to announce that I have been chosen as the first “Java Champion” in India. Java today is a mature technology that is being taught and used throughout the software world. However it is still evolving and venturing into new domains and uses. This is an exciting time to be working on Java and the ‘Java Champion’ selection makes it that much more fun. It is also great motivation for us at Rightrix Solutions to continue our Java work through Rightrix Research, IndicThreads.com and the IndicThreads.com Conference On Java Technology.

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“Citizens cannot be denied the comfort they deserve, innovators the recognition“

A couple of days back, the Tata’s launched the much hyped 1 lakh car, the Nano. The car is believed to be the cheapest in the world and is expected to revolutionize travel in India. The car looks good and also seems to come with a decent set of features. Considering that hardly any Indian companies consider research and innovation a priority, the Nano is a significant achievement for the Tatas.

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I am writing this column from the Oracle OpenWorld conference in San Francisco on an Internet connection that’s as fast as the Internet speed of half of Pune put together. It’s strange how fast Internet connections always put me in a good mood. Anyway, talking of OpenWorld, it’s an annual event that has over 40,000 people coming to San Francisco from over a 100 countries. It’s amazing that the city can pull off such a mammoth event fairly easily and the infrastructure doesn’t collapse under the load.

The city administration seems to go the extra mile to ensure that delegates have an enjoyable and safe visit to the city. Although OpenWorld is the biggest, it is just one of the many events that happen all year round at the Moscone Center. Each event not only gets people to San Francisco and works as a great public relations exercise for the city but also pumps millions of dollars into the economy of San Francisco.

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I am pleased to inform you about the IndicThreads.com Conference On Java Technology 2007 that will be held on 26th and 27th October 2007 at Pune, India.

The conference is an independent event with indepth vendor-neutral technical sessions about Web Services, Ajax, SOA, EJB, Mashups, Frameworks, JSF, Data Caching, Dependency Injection, Patterns and various other aspects of Java software development.

The event is a gathering of the best Java brains in the business and a place to learn from technology thought leaders about the latest and greatest in Java technology. It is also a great place to network and meet like-minded people from across companies and industry segments.

Registrations for the IndicThreads.com Conference On Java Technology 2007 are open. Register now to grab the very early bird discount that closes on the 31st of Aug 07.

The conference website is http://conference.indicthreads.com. Do check it out.

Being the editor of IndicThreads and a speaker at the event, I certainly will be around at the conference. Look forward to seeing you there.

What’s the difference between the prime minister’s speech on 15th Aug 1947 and 15th Aug 2007? What’s the difference between the president’s and chief minister’s TV addresses in the 80s and those in 2007? The content and the speakers sure have changed, but there have been no changes in the medium of delivery. While technology and presentation mediums have improved dramatically, government and political addresses are still consistently delivered in a dry boring format. In their current form, these speeches would be watched only if the nation is going through some crisis and people are looking for direction from the leader, a la Mussharaf in a troubled Pakistan. However at other times, I wonder how many countrymen would watch for more than a few minutes….

(Cont…Click the scanned article image on the left). Published as part of my column for the Maharashtra Herald that’s published on alternate Saturdays )

For reasons only known to the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC), the PMC has now changed the official website from http://www.egovpmc.com to http://www.punecorporation.org and killed egovpmc.com.

PuneCorporation.org is definitely a better name than egovpmc, but why kill the established egovpmc.com? They could have just redirected to the new site. PMC also hasn’t shown the sense to buy the domain name PuneCorporation.com. So please note that http://www.punecorporation.org is the official site while PuneCorporation.com is a fake.

However if you are hoping to get some work done on the corporation site, it doesn’t matter if egovpmc.com or punecorporation.org is the official site, because both sites are currently not working.

I think it’s time to use the Right To Information and check which politician’s family member is minting money by bagging these contracts for the PMC websites and delivering rubbish in return.

Questions deal with basic Java as well as enterprise Java. You get 30 min to solve a Java question online. The winner this week gets a copy of the book “Beginning EJB 3 Application Development”. Monthly and series winners get music players and an iPod. >> Click here to enter the contest

IndicThreads.com invites submissions for the IndicThreads.com Conference On Java Technology 2007 to be held on 26th and 27th October 2007 at the Symbiosis Infotech Campus, Hinjewadi IT Park, Pune, India. The conference is the premier independent conference on Java technology in Asia and is the place to be, to learn the latest in the Java world while meeting with like-minded individuals from across the industry. You can find details of last year’s conference at http://conference.indicthreads.com

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“IT walon ney sab mehanga kar diya hai” said the travel agent after charging me a hefty sum for a Volvo bus ticket. Apparently it was peak season and any bus destination that was remotely interesting to the IT walas in Pune was selling at many times the normal rate. The agent was of the chatty kind and after inquiring about things ranging from the origins of my family to the reason for the trip, he said that the common Puneite won’t pay any amount that he asked for, but the IT walas blow money like crazy and will pay thousands without any hesitation. So naturally everything has become expensive.

IT people sure have made life difficult for most others. Few other industries can match the pay packets or the glamour associated with IT today. Take any product or service that would interest an IT professional and you would see that the price has at least doubled every 2 to 3 years …(Continued in the scanned article image on the left)