When starting my current project (http://trac.serveall.net/ibidem/), I knew
I wanted to base it on the Spring framework (http://www.springsource.org/).
It's a Java based application framework that provides a very good base to
build on. However, it does have a learning curve. In the process of studying
Spring, I discovered Grails.

Grails (http://www.grails.org/) is a framework uses the Groovy language and
sits on top of Spring and Hibernate (an object relational mapper). Groovy is
a dynamic language that compiles down to Java byte code.

The nice thing about Grails is its philosophy of "convention over
configuration." This ends up giving you the benefits of Spring with an
easier learning curve. It's really the development environment that I've
always dreamed of working in.

HTH

-Brad

On Tue, Jan 5, 2010 at 5:04 PM, marijane white <[log in to unmask]>wrote:

> Greetings Code4Lib,
>
> Long time lurker, first time poster here.
>
> I've been turning over this question in my mind for a few weeks now, and
> Joe
> Hourcle's postscript in the Online PHP Course thread has prompted me to
> finally try to ask it. =)
>
> I'm interested in hearing how the members of this list have gone about
> choosing development platforms for their library coding projects and/or
> existing open source projects (ie like VuFind vs Blacklight).  For example,
> did you choose a language you already were familiar with?  One you wanted
> to
> learn more about?  Does your workplace have a standard enterprise
> architecture/platform that you are required to use?  If you have chosen to
> implement an existing open source project, did you choose based on the
> development platform or project maturity and features or something else?
>
> Some background -- thanks to my undergraduate computer engineering studies,
> I have a pretty solid understanding of programming fundamentals, but most
> of
> my pre-LIS work experience was in software testing and did not require me
> to
> employ much of what I learned programming-wise, so I've mostly dabbled over
> the last decade or so.  I've got a bit of experience with a bunch of
> languages and I'm not married to any of them.   I also kind of like having
> excuses to learn new ones.
>
> My situation is this: I would like to eventually implement a discovery tool
> at MPOW, but I am having a hell of a time choosing one.  I'm a solo
> librarian on a content team at a software and information services company,
> so I'm not really tied to the platforms used by the software engineering
> teams here.  I know a bit of Ruby, so I've played with Blacklight some, got
> it to install on Windows and managed to import a really rough Solr index.
> I'm more attracted to the features in VuFind, but I don't know much PHP yet
> and I haven't gotten it installed successfully yet.  My collection's
> metadata is not in an ILS (yet) and not in MARC, so I've also considered
> trying out more generic approaches like ajax-solr (though I don't know a
> lot
> of javascript yet, either).  I've also given a cursory look at SOPAC and
> Scriblio.  My options are wide open, and I'm having a rough time deciding
> what direction to go in.  I guess it's kind of similar to someone who is
> new
> to programming and attempting to choose their first language to learn.
>
> I will attempt to head off a programming language religious war =) by
> stating that I'm not really interested in the virtues of one platform over
> another, moreso the abstract reasons one might have for selecting one.
> Have any of you ever been in a similar situation?  How'd you get yourself
> unstuck?  If you haven't, what do you think you might do in a situation
> like
> mine?
>
>
> -marijane
>



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