All of the NEFS sample application are available at http://www.netspective.com (by clicking the Try It Online link from the Home page). Each of the sample applications have two links: one is a link to the application itself and the other is a link to it's Console Servlet.

The NEFS uses simple XML tags as its object construction and declaration language. The Enterprise Sampler application provides links on every page that allow you to learn how a few simple lines of XML can produce sophisticated web based applications.

The Netspective administration console, called the Enterprise Console, provides a complete file browser with color syntax highlighting for XML, JSP, Java, JavaScript, and SQL files – this file browser allows you to review source code for online sample applications or locally if you downloaded the sample applications.

The Enterprise Console is a special Sparx Servlet that provides a browser-based administrative interface to all of the dynamic components and objects that NEFS produces. The Enterprise Console is automatically available to all NEF-based applications during development and each NEFS application has a private instance of the Console available at http://[server]/[appName]/console. When you log into the Console for Application X (.../appX/console) versus Y (.../appY/console) you will only see components for the appropriate application.

	Important
	Each sample app features its own Console Servlet and the default login user name is 'console' and the default login password is 'console'.

Once you have logged into the Console for any particular application, all of the source files and folders are available for viewing. Simply click on the Project tab and then click Project Folders to view all of the folders contained in the application and Project Files to navigate all the directories and look at the project files. The first time you enter the Project Files section, you should see a list of all the directories that exist in the application’s root directory. You can click on any directory to navigate to it and view the list of files and sub-directories inside it.

If you click on any XML, JSP or Java source file, you should also be able to see the source for those files directly from the browser.

NEFS Enterprise Console contains complete documentation for the XDM tags that are used to create NEFS applications. To access this documentation, login to the Enterprise Console and click the XDM Tags Reference tab. It displays the documentation for the Project tag along with a list of its attributes and all the children elements.

Click on a child element to view the corresponding tag documentation.

The NEF ships with many built-in Commands and Value Sources. You can view a complete list of the available commands and value sources through the Enterprise Console.

Accessing Commands

Login to the Enterprise Console. Click on the Project tab and then click the Commands submenu to view the list of all the available Commands.

Accessing Value Sources

To view a list of all the value sources available to your project (including all built-in value sources and your own custom value sources) click on the Project tab in the Enterprise Console. Then click the Value Sources submenu and view the list of all the available Value Sources.

Since NEFS comprises Java libraries, a fundamental requirement to develop applications with it is a Java SDK (the full SDK is required, the JRE will not be enough). You can obtain Sun’s official Java SDK from its Java web site at http://java.sun.com/j2se/1.4/download.html. This is a link to the Java 1.4 SDK but Java 1.2 and 1.3 will also work.

Since Sparx works with standard J2EE application servers, a Servlet container is required if you're going to use Sparx. Both Axiom and Commons work in web-based or non-web-based applications but Sparx is a web application development library so an application server with a Servlet 2.2 or better container is necessary. Sparx-based applications have been tested on the following application servers:

Note

We recommend the Caucho Resin application server if you're not familiar with other Servlet containers or if you're new to Java/J2EE application servers. It's an easy to install, easy to use, and fast Servlet container with advanced features that rival other more expensive application servers such as WebLogic and WebSphere. Resin is free for development use but requires a paid license before putting your application into production use. Rest assured though that all Sparx-based applications you write, even on Resin, will remain app-server neutral.

You can also optionally install a Java integrated development environment (IDE) for developing NEFS applications. The Netspective Frameworks do not require any particular Java IDE and if you prefer to use simple text editors like vi, emacs, or TextPad those will work just as well. We recommend the free Eclipse IDE or very affordable and useful JetBrain’s IDEA for those who are not already familiar with other IDEs.

To keep things simple, there's no special "evaluation kit" for NEFS -- instead you just download a sample application from http://www.netspective.com (click "Downloads" at the top of the page then pick "Sample Applications" from the Downloads page). Once you download an application, just drop it into your favorite Servlet container (application server) and you'll be ready for the evaluation. Each of the sample applications are provided as app-server-independent .war files and each sample app's .war file includes all of the NEFS binary files, resources, etc. you need to use NEF. Once you have downloaded any .war file, you have everything you need to start modifying and adding to the app. The typical procedure is: