I have always been a fan of Google’s products as I have been made aware of them, and on very few occasions have I had anything negative to say about them. I recently have started using yet another assistance provided by Google that is, in my opinion, one of the single most helpful and creative tools to be offered free of charge to the development community. I speak of none other than the Google Web Toolkit. This Java application allows you to build quite extensive AJAX utilities from within the tool itself. What I find very interesting about it is that you literally write your application in Java (using a GUI that is provided with the Toolkit, if you choose), and the Toolkit then generates your markup and JavaScript for the final product.

As with all things Google, the only downside I have run into is the inclusion and dependency on their proprietary third party libraries within my applications to get the JavaScript to run smoothly. However, this seems a pittance since their libraries are so much more robust than any I could create from scratch (and why wouldn’t they be with the developers, hours and money they have to put into such libraries). I have come to the conclusion that if your site is going to depend on any externally hosted libraries or APIs, what better host than Google? Now, I would definitely be in heaven if Google would take the approach of Yahoo! with their Yahoo! User Interface library (YUI) and release an actual core JavaScript library which could be included both on external and internally hosted sites, but I don’t see this coming along any time soon.

Now, as to developing a web application entirely in Java, it takes some getting used to, but the results can be amazing. Simply looking over the “Kitchen Sink” example packaged with a download of the Web Toolkit quickly shows you the raw power available for you to quickly tap. While it will probably be some time before I use this tool as part of my personal projects, it is definitely a resource I recommend the avid web developer take the time to research and possibly learn. Yet again, Google comes out with a winner. I may take the time in the upcoming weeks to delve into a few other Google tools I have been using (such as the Google Maps API and Open Social), but for now, suffice to say that I seem to constantly have something from Google on my radar to learn.