dhtmlx

[christian_cadieux]

Is ExtJS planning to add an extension plugin for Dhtmlx.
Their components seem very powerful and flexible and would be a nice addition.
Also, the Dhtmlx components include a large number of examples covering most of the
features, which makes them very accessible to a beginner like me.

But I like the ExtJS framework, which is very powerful and consistent.

thanks

[evant]

As far as I'm aware, there are no plans to support it.

I just had a look at the front page, what does it provide that Ext doesn't?

[christian_cadieux]

the components appear to be more mature/faster and the documentation has more example
of what can be done with a component.
extjs has very few examples and reading thru each function and attribure of the API is a very
difficult way to figure out how to do something.
For example, dhtmls has a treegrid that is simple to use. I am sure that a treegrid can be
programmed in extjs, but I would not know where to begin...
Extjs is very easy to use for beginner who just want to combine a few static components, but
beyond that , it is a bit of a mystery. dhtmlx doc is more focused on use-cases, as opposed to
just the API doc. Just from reading the extjs api, I could not figure out anything , could not
see the forest from the trees. I had to loop at the examples which are not very documented/
too simplistic and not very organized.
For example, I would like doc for the tabpanel that explains all the different ways to load the content of the panels (html, programmatic, url etc..) with clear examples. All I could find in
the doc was a simple example with hardcoded html text (http://extjs.com/deploy/dev/examples/tabs/tabs-example.js), then reading the API and trying to
figure out what my options are.
Dhtmlx grid for example, includes 200 samples of different ways to use that one component.

I am not complaining about extjs, it's the best there is, I can tell it has amazing power. It's just
hard to get proficient at it with the current documentation.

my 2 cents.

[JeffHowden]

Dhtmlx grid for example, includes 200 samples of different ways to use that one component.

Not to nitpick, but I only counted 111 examples, most marked pro which require a purchase of significant expense that you can then only use on a single project (unless you pony up for their enterprise level license). Even if you count their tree grid examples, that's only an additional 15 examples, again, almost entirely pro.

Based on their business model (having different levels of product with different feature sets for the free vs paid market), it is in their best interest to pump out as many examples as possible, not to make the paid-up developers life easier, but to make it easier for the developer making the pitch to get a budget.

I'm not saying Ext couldn't benefit for more examples, but at the end of the day the motivation behind these two sites is completely different.

FWIW, I personally don't see any benefit to Ext spending any time trying to manage any sort of integration with dhtmlx. In fact, I don't share your opinion that their products are more mature. I find them to be clunky and not terribly well put together.

[Animal]

It has no fully integrated Container/Component hierarchy. Each (very pretty) widget is an island of HTML. It has no overarching scheme.

Does it support OO? Attaching event handlers does not seem to use a scope. I've seen some "events" being handled by injecting function implementations eg



mygrid.setOnCheckHandler(doOnCheck);


So only one event handler?

The API browser is not that good, so I can't really tell if there's another way. There does not seem to be any object inheritance specified there, so I can't tell if there's anything like an "Observable" superclass.

[christian_cadieux]

so that's a no ;-)

thanks for the answers.

I have to admit that the more I dig into extjs, the more it is starting to make sense, and the
more I like it.

I can see that dhtmlx can be useful for adding dynamic components to an existing static site.
Where extjs is a complete framework for designing web2.0 apps from the ground up.

They (dhtmlx) definitely try to make it look like the learning curve of their product is very short, with
lots of examples...

[Animal]

You've hit the nail on the head. Ext handles everything, and offers great hooks to extend and add your own extras.

Just check the foundation utilities like Element, EventObject, Observable and the Function extensions. They add so much power.

Ajax handling is very powerful.

The data handling widgets seperate the Model, View and Controller very elegantly.

And then you've got the layout concept where nested layouts cascade reflows where necessary for a truly dynamic application.

No other browser UI library comes close.

[stefan.riedel-seifert]

Hello,

we have some components of the suite in use. The new suite has some new features
similiar to ExtJS. The have a data processor simliar to data writer and other stuff.
You can build impressive things with sparse time.

Meanwhile they have also a layout/component model.

I have figured out two enervations: the css-model is weak: its hard to make your own theme. And their frameworks does not work, if your page has a <form> element.
We work in an area (SAP) which uses this heavily. (Server-side tags-libs).

They deliver also an adapter to user their grid-component within ExtJS.

And their components have more than 1 event.

On the other hand, i can confirm, what the others said: there is no strong overall architecture like in ExtJS.

I for myself have worked with the suite and attained good results, but hopefully
we become ExtJS customer in the near future, because: i love ExtJS.

We switch then 3.0 is stable available.

Best regards to all,
Stefan