This post originated from an RSS feed registered with Agile Buzz by Greg Vaughn. Original Post: Naked Objects Exposed Feed Title: Potential Differences Feed URL: http://gigavolt.net/blog/development/index.rss Feed Description: Greg Vaughn on Agile methodologies, Java, OS X, whatever piques my interest! Latest Agile Buzz Posts Latest Agile Buzz Posts by Greg Vaughn Latest Posts From Potential Differences

I think I now have a handle on what makes Naked Objects interesting. I had previously perused the site and came to the preliminary conclusion that it’s just a generic UI framework. Last night at the DFWPP (Dallas-Ft.Worth Pragmatic Practitioners) meeting I got to hear Dave Thomas talk about Naked Objects (and believe me, it is a topic rich with double entendres). It helps me to think of Naked Objects in a parallel manner to TDD (Test Driven Development).

On the surface TDD looks like it is primarily a means of testing. The ‘aha’ moment happens when you invert your thinking. TDD is primarily a design tool, and secondarily a testing method. It ends up that testable code is more cohesive and loosely coupled, and that’s the major benefit. My ‘aha’ moment with Naked Objects happened when I began to see it as primarily a design and requirements gathering tool, and secondarily a UI framework. Coding in Naked Objects style promotes minimal temporal coupling (the GUI is modeless), complete business rules in the business objects (none of it hanging in the GUI layer), and explicit relationships between business objects (so the GUI knows what can be dragged and dropped onto what).

So, just as TDD taught us that testable code is well designed code, so now Naked Objects are teaching us that naked (or maybe strippable?) code is well designed code. Also in a parallel vein, we know that the unit tests from TDD are rarely going to be a sufficient amount of testing, so also the GUI of Naked Objects is rarely going to be a sufficient GUI. Just as the more traditional functional, system, and user acceptance tests can be added to a TDD-built system, so too can a more traditional menued, or script-driven GUI be added to a Naked Objects-built system.

Dave will be giving that Naked Objects talk (and also one on Coupling! I warned you about the double entendres) at the Atlanta Java Software Symposium this coming weekend. Come if you can! <shameless-plug>You can even hear me speak on JMX, IO Performance Tuning, and Expressive Code there too.</shameless-plug>

Note: This is crossposted to my java.net weblog.