Supercharge your Ajax development with Google Web Toolkit (GWT)

If you develop web applications and haven’t looked at Google Web Toolkit (GWT), this would be a great time to do it. The product is now out of beta, and the latest version (1.4) adds a ton of new features and performance enhancements.

“In addition to making debugging far easier, GWT’s unique compilation-based approach to Ajax rewards developers for good software engineering practices,” says Bruce Johnson, a member of the GWT team. “Java source code that is clear and organized can be easily optimized by the GWT compiler,“GWT will really save you time in maintenance” which is a nice antidote to the frequent hack-and-slash approach that’s all too common in JavaScript development.”

Maintaining a complex Ajax application over time without GWT is a major challenge, says Johnson. “If you are currently working on an ambitious Ajax project and haven’t yet come to this conclusion, please re-read this post in six months when you’re further along!”