About BioPathWorks
Lexikos Corporation is developing the core VTS 2.0 as
a Java web app, suitable for download as a WAR file.
The key distinguishing elements of this web app are:
- It is a GROUPWARE site
of booths hosting interactive exhibits.
- Simple ADMINPAGES let
HTML coders configure each booth.
- Custom HTML tags built and
sold as JSPs implement the exhibits.
Our first client - the partnership of Shadowcats and
MESDA - has beta tested 1.xx VTS software enough to
define the key improvements needed
for a 2.0 production release. This site shows that
work in progress. Feedback, labor, suggestions,
sponsors,
and other help will be welcome from any quarter.
Dan Corwin,
R&D Manager
Tasks Needed for 2.0
These two projects are vital for a public release, as they
define respectively the rules/equipment for an online game,
and its players:
Besides them, several key tasks defined in this booth seem needed:
GROUPWARE
This web site seeks to help groups interact
dynamically with people who comprise them, who want to
do business with them, or who want to discover them.
At different domains, these groups may be SIGs
(as on this site), or businesses, departments, etc..
The group represented by the booth is
called a MEMBER of the VTS,
who must be properly modeled. A key goal is make the
booth is easy to discover on-line. Each MEMBER
adds text to help, which certain key projects -
Google and
UDDI and
Metadata - can map effectively
into remote Internet registries.
ADMINISTRATION PAGES
Secure pages that let authorized USERS reconfigure
a booth (or their own USER data) are vital.
By VTS policy, HTML skills are not needed to use them,
as typical booth content holds included text as
files or fields, editable as on-line content in any
browser.
"Advanced" booth maintenance does require HTML
skills, knowledge of VTS tagsets, and ways to
to use them in booth exhibits. Each MEMBER group
needs at least one such USER on its booth admin team.
This page discusses the utilities
such a person needs. The most urgently needed (again):
a general-purpose file uploader.
TAGSETS
As a page is served, each VTS tag on it gets
expanded into text defined by its (hidden) arguments.
The tags let a booth "do things".
Ultimately, ALL interaction at this site runs under
tags, an overloaded term with three distinct meanings:
- Standard HTML tags (hotlinks, SUBMIT buttons, etc.)
- Custom HTML tags (which expand into JSP/servlet calls)
- JSTL tags (which help define the logic of JSPs)
A few example tags of type #2 are now
documented in our training suite. In syntax, each such
tag is just an HTML comment holding text, not unlike
a DOS command: the name of some (JSP) program, and String args.
If you can write a JSP, we can publish it as this kind of
tag. This will demo what your code can do. We can
also help publish the code itself if you want, so other Java
coders can review and critique it. And we can help sell it.
We expect most MEMBERS to buy (versus build) most of
the tags they use to build their booth,
as that kind of reuse saves work, time, and money,
especially if they meet common needs, such as..
This task will complete the generic GuestBook code
and extend it to the processing to any posted form.
The work to be done includes changes to the GuestBook
log format, support of the email
notification code on additions, adding on-site
purge controls, and enabling the download of logs in
CSV format (for Excel or Access).
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