1. Overview of Developing Jot Applications, Page Types, Plugins, and Themes

A Jotspot wiki isn't just a wiki--it's a full-featured application platform. Not only can you easily customize the appearance of your wiki, you can extend its functionality and build your own collaborative web apps. With Jotspot, simple web apps are simple to build and can easily be personalized and adapted to specific needs. And because they're just part of the wiki, they can evolve right along with the rest of your wiki content.

What Can I Build?

With Jotspot, you can build:

• Applications that bring structure and organization to your wiki content.
• Page Types to make it easy to create wiki pages that break free of simple text
• Plugins that extend the framework of your wiki.
• Themes that customize your wiki's look and feel.

Applications

Want to make it easier to add, organize, and view specific types of information in your wiki? Need a way to manage processes and information that are unique to your organization? Build a custom web app for your Jotspot!

A Jot app can be a simple data collection and viewing solution like a company directory:

Or a full-fledged collaborative application for managing complex data and processes, like an Issue Tracker:

Jot's application model enables you to start small and grow your app over time. You might start by creating a form to define a consistent structure for a certain type of information that's frequently added to your wiki, or by making minor changes to existing application so it's a better match for how you work. Because it's easy to get the first cut up and running and easy to make changes, Jot apps can evolve based on user behavior and changing business conditions.

If you haven't already, check out the Jot Application Gallery to get a feel for the kinds of apps that are possible.

Page Types

Page Types (tutorial) allow users to easily create and organize wiki pages that offer application-like functionality. Example page types include to-do lists, calendar pages, email lists, and photo albums.

Plugins

Really wish that every Jotspot page had a link to your website or can't wait for Jotspot to roll out an "official" version of that feature you really need? Create a Jot Plugin! Plugins (tutorial) are bite-sized add-ons that customize and extend JotSpot by inserting your own code into the user interface.

A plugin can do something as simple as displaying some additional information in the sidebar, such as the page author and creation date:

Or can provide a completely new feature like the dojo-enabled dynamic tags plugin:

For more examples of what you can do with Jot plugins, check out the ExamplePlugins page.

Themes

Want to change the face of your wiki? Create your own Jotspot theme! A theme (tutorial) is a collection of modular CSS style sheets that control the look and feel of your Jotspot site. You can override the default Jotspot styles and create custom stylesheets that add entirely new CSS classes to Jotspot.

By creating a theme, you can do everything from tweaking the colors a little:

To creating a totally different look:

How Do I Build These Things?

By creating wiki pages, of course! Everything--CSS styles, application code, and plugin code-- can be added to a wiki page by editing the page in script markup or XML mode.

The JotLib provides the functions you need to make your application and plugin code work. JotLib functions can be accessed in a number of ways:

• Using an HTML-like tag syntax called JotScript
• Using Server-Side Javascript
• From any HTTP-capable client using REST

You're not restricted to using any one access method (known in Jot-speak as an embedding)--you can freely mix and match them in whatever way you want.

To tie everything together, you use XPath expressions, which provide the mechanism for referencing specific page content, defining complex search queries, and specifying conditions.

Using JotLib, you can do things like:

• Structure your wiki content
• Find and present wiki content dynamically
• Integrate content from other Websites into your wiki pages

Do I Have to be a Programmer?

While the Jot platform enables experienced programmers to build sophisticated web apps in record time, it is designed so that everyone can personalize, modify, and share applications. To start building your own Jot apps from scratch, you should have at least a rudimentary knowledge of:

• HTML basics
• XPath basics
• Basic programming concepts like variables, conditionals, and looping

To create themes, you'll also want to be familiar with CSS.

Of course, if you are an experienced programmer who wants to use AJAX, SVG, and other hot technologies, to create killer web-apps on the Jot platform, your knowledge won't go unrewarded--and you'll be amazed at how easy Jot makes it to create desktop-grade apps.

I Need to Know More!

The rest of this Get the Big Picture series describes how you program in the Jot environment, explains how pages and forms provide the underpinnings for your apps and plugins, and shows how XPath expressions are used to tie things together:

1. Data Model & API (watch the video)
2. Structuring Data
3. Presenting Data
4. XPath Expressions

For a hands-on experience, your next stop should be the Get Started tutorials, which will walk you through building your first app, plugin, or theme.

Of course, if you're an experienced programmer, you might want to just dive right into the sample code and start tinkering. Be sure to check out the sample code download area as well as the collection of example code snippets. If you need information about specific JotLib features or functions, you can turn to the \JotLib Reference.

Should you have questions that don't seem to have answers in the docs, you can always post to the Developer Forums here on the JDC.

Also, remember that as a registered JDC member, you can comment directly on the doc pages, add examples to the doc collection, and even edit pages to contribute content or make corrections. We encourage you to share what you've learned with other Jot developers!