Groovy for Java Developers

This course teaches experienced Java developers how to write programs in Groovy that simplify, enhance, and expand their existing systems.

• Understand how dynamic languages differ from languages like Java or C#
• Work with Groovy closures
• Use Groovy control structures
• Build object-oriented programs in Groovy
• Use Groovy builders to reduce complexity
• Access databases using Groovy
• Process XML files in Groovy
• Write unit tests in Groovy
• Access Java classes from Groovy, and vice versa
• Build a simple web application using Grails

All attendees should have a good knowledge of Java techniques, including the Collections framework and JDBC.

• Groovy Fundamentals
  • Differences between Groovy and Java
  • Compiling and executing Groovy programs
  • The basic Groovy data types and optional typing
  • Writing Groovy scripts
  • Declaring classes
  • Overriding operators and type coercion
  • GDK: the Groovy library
  • Groovy strings
  • Regular expressions in Groovy
• Groovy Collections
  • Ranges
  • Lists
  • Maps
  • Iterators and polymorphic algorithms
• Closures in Groovy
  • Declaring closures
  • Available options for calling closures
• Groovy Control Structures
  • The "Groovy truth"
  • Conditional execution
  • Looping constructs
• Using Classes and Scripts
  • Groovy fields and local variables
  • Methods and operations
  • Safe dereferencing with the ?. operator
  • Organizing classes in packages
  • Using inheritance
  • Working with GroovyBeans
  • Injecting methods with Categories
  • A bit about the Expando metaclass
• Groovy Builders
  • NodeBuilder
  • MarkupBuilder
  • SwingBuilder
• Survey of the GDK
  • Simplified File access
  • Templates
  • Groovlets
• Database Access with Groovy
  • Basic database operations
  • DataSet operations
  • Groovy and ORM solutions
• Working with XML
  • Reading and parsing XML documents
  • Using XPath expressions
  • Distributed processing with XML
• Unit Testing in Groovy
  • GroovyTestCase
  • Unit-testing Groovy code
  • Unit-testing Java code
  • Code coverage and automation
• Web Development with Grails
  • The Grails framework
  • Creating web applications using Grails