Introduction

JDeveloper and ADF (Application Development Framework) are amazing technologies. What makes them even more incredible is their sheer complexity and the amount of knowledge and effort that lies covered underneath the declarative, almost magical frontend. What amazes me is that once you scratch the surface, you never stop realizing how much you really don't know. Given this complexity, it becomes obvious that certain development guidelines and practices must be established and followed early in the architectural and design phases of an ADF project.

This chapter presents a number of recipes that are geared towards establishing some of these development practices. In particular, you will see content that serves as a starting point in making your own application modular when using the underlying technologies. You will also learn the importance of extending the Business Components framework (ADF-BC) base classes early in the development cycle. We will talk about the importance of laying out other application foundational components, such as logging and exceptions, again early in the development process, and continue with addressing reusability and consistency at the ViewController layer.

The chapter starts with a recipe about installing and configuring JDeveloper on Linux. So, let's get started and don't forget, have fun as you go along. If you get in trouble at any point, take a look at the accompanying source code and feel free to contact me anytime at <nharalabidis@gmail.com>.