![\"testing\"](\"guides/getting_started/loader-warning-viewport.png\")
Ext JS 4 is by far the biggest overhaul weâve ever made to Ext JS, and constitutes the most advanced JavaScript framework ever created. Almost every area of the framework has been upgraded, from the generated HTML to the class system. Weâve unified APIs, added incredible new capabilities, and improved the performance of the entire framework.
\n\nWith Ext JS 4 weâve been driven by three key goals: speed, robustness and ease of use. We wanted the framework to be as fast and as robust as possible on every browser, and to be easy to learn and use. To achieve this we took the whole framework back to the drawing board, and what weâve come back with is the fastest, most bullet-proof version of Ext JS weâve ever created. Best of all, weâve managed to do it while staying true to the core experience of writing apps âthe Ext JS way.â
\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nExt JS 4 supports almost any known web browsers, from Internet Explorer 6 to Chrome 11. During development, we recommend that you choose one of the following as the primary browsers for the best debugging experience:
\n\nPlease refer to the dedicated Debugging Handbook guide on the recommended tools for each and every browser, as well as how to make use of them to aid development.
\n\nEven though a local web server is not a requirement to use Ext JS 4, it is still highly recommended that you develop with one, since XHR over local file:// protocol has cross origin restriction on most browsers.
\n\nDownload Ext JS 4 SDK if you haven't done so. Unzip the package within your web root directory tree. This guide assumes that http://localhost/ext-4.0 points to the top level directory of the downloaded SDK.
Open http://localhost/ext-4.0/index.html on your web browser. If a welcome page appears, you are all set.
Although not being mandatory, all suggestions listed below should be considered as best-practice guidelines to keep your application well organized, extensible and maintainable.
\n\n- appname\n - app\n - namespace\n - Class1.js\n - Class2.js\n - ...\n - resources\n - css\n - images\n - ...\n - app.js\n - index.html\nin which:
\n\nappname is a directory containing all your application's source filesapp contains all your classes, the naming style of which should follow the convention listed in the Class System guideresources contains additional CSS and image files which are responsible for the look and feel of the application, as well as other static resources (XML, JSON, etc.)index.html is the entry-point HTML documentapp.js contains your own application's logicAn Ext JS application is self-contained in a single HTML document, the content of which has this format:
\n\n<html>\n<head>\n <title>Application Name</title>\n\n <link rel=\"stylesheet\" type=\"text/css\" href=\"path/to/sdk/resources/css/ext-all.css\">\n <script type=\"text/javascript\" src=\"path/to/sdk/ext-debug.js\"></script>\n <script type=\"text/javascript\" src=\"app.js\"></script>\n</head>\n<body></body>\n</html>\nwhereby:
\n\npath/to/sdk points to Ext JS 4 SDK directory in section 1.4path/to/sdk/resources/css/ext-all.css contains all styling information needed for the whole frameworkpath/to/sdk/ext(-debug).js contains Ext JS 4 Core library (or path/to/sdk/ext-all(-debug).js, as explained below)From this point you need to choose between 2 different library inclusion methods. Each has its own pros and cons listed below:
\n\nInclude path/to/sdk/ext-all.js (path/to/sdk/ext-all-debug.js during development), which contains the whole framework.
Include path/to/sdk/ext.js (path/to/sdk/ext-debug.js during development) which contains just the minimum core library, and make use of Ext.Loader for automatic dependencies resolution.
In summary, it is recommended that you should only use ext-all(-debug).js if you need to shorten the initial learning curve. Otherwise, ext(-debug).js is preferred in most cases for actual application development.
Last but not least, app.js is the entry-point of your own application's logic. For a basic application, the typical format of which may look like this:
// Register namespaces and their corresponding paths to Ext.Loader\nExt.Loader.setPath({\n 'AppName': 'app',\n ... // Other namespaces\n});\n\n// Specify a list of classes your application your application needs\nExt.require([\n ...\n]);\n\n// Application's initialization\nExt.onReady(function() {\n\n ...\n\n});\nExt JS 4 shipped with a robust MVC architecture which maximize extensibility and maintainability for medium to large scale applications. Please refer to the MVC Application Architecture guide for detailed instructions.
\n\nThe newly introduced Sencha SDK Tools (download here ) makes deployment of any Ext JS 4 application easier than ever. The tools allows you to generate a manifest of all dependencies in the form of a JSB3 (JSBuilder file format) file, and create a minimal custom build of just what your application needs within minutes.
\n\nOnce you've installed the SDK Tools, open a terminal window and navigate into your application's directory.
\n\ncd path/to/application\nFrom here you only need to run a couple of simple commands. The first one generates a JSB3 file:
\n\nsencha create jsb -a index.html -p app.jsb3\nThis scans your index.html file for all framework and application files that are actually used by the app, and then creates a JSB file called app.jsb3. Generating the JSB3 first gives us a chance to modify the generated app.jsb3 before building - this can be helpful if you have custom resources to copy, but in most cases we can immediately proceed to build the application with the second command:
sencha build -p app.jsb3 -d .\nThis takes the JSB3 file and creates an app-all.js, which is a minimized build of your application plus all of the Ext JS classes required to run it. It also creates an all-classes.js file, which has the same classes as app-all.js, but is not minified so is very useful for debugging problems with your built application. In short, app-all.js is the minified and production-ready version of all-classes.js + app.js.
Most applications will need a separate index.html for the deployed version of the app, for example to add Analytics includes or other production-only logic into that file. Typically you would end up with a production index.html file that looks like this:
<html>\n<head>\n <title>Application Name</title>\n\n <link rel=\"stylesheet\" type=\"text/css\" href=\"path/to/sdk/resources/css/ext-all.css\">\n <script type=\"text/javascript\" src=\"path/to/sdk/ext.js\"></script>\n <script type=\"text/javascript\" src=\"app-all.js\"></script>\n</head>\n<body></body>\n</html>\nNotice that path/to/sdk/ext-debug.js has been replaced with path/to/sdk/ext.js, and app.js has been replaced with app-all.js in this production version, comparing with the development one described in section 2.1
For applications built on top of a dynamic server-side language like PHP, Ruby, ASP, etc., you can simply replace index.html in the first command to the actual URL of your application. This URL should be the same with what is viewable on the browsers during development. For example:
sencha create jsb -a http://localhost/path/to/application/index.php -p app.jsb3\nPlease check back soon
\n" + "guide": "Ext JS 4 is by far the biggest overhaul weâve ever made to Ext JS, and constitutes the most advanced JavaScript framework ever created. Almost every area of the framework has been upgraded, from the generated HTML to the class system. Weâve unified APIs, added incredible new capabilities, and improved the performance of the entire framework.
\n\nWith Ext JS 4 weâve been driven by three key goals: speed, robustness and ease of use. We wanted the framework to be as fast and as robust as possible on every browser, and to be easy to learn and use. To achieve this we took the whole framework back to the drawing board, and what weâve come back with is the fastest, most bullet-proof version of Ext JS weâve ever created. Best of all, weâve managed to do it while staying true to the core experience of writing apps âthe Ext JS way.â
\n\nExt JS 4 supports almost any known web browsers, from Internet Explorer 6 to Chrome 11. During development, however, we recommend that you choose one of the following browsers for the best debugging experience:
\n\nThis tuturial assumes you are using Google Chrome 11. If you don't already have Chrome take a moment to install it, and familiarize yourself with the Chrome Developer Tools.
\n\nEven though a local web server is not a requirement to use Ext JS 4, it is still highly recommended that you develop with one, since XHR over local file:// protocol has cross origin restriction on most browsers.\nIf you don't already have a local web server it is recommended that you download and install Apache HTTP Server.
\n\nOnce you have installed or enabled apache you can verify that Apache is running by navigating to localhost in your browser. You should see a startup page indicating that Apache HTTP Server was installed successfully and is running.
\n\nDownload Ext JS 4 SDK. Unzip the package to a new directory called \"extjs\" within your web root directory. If you aren't sure where your web root directory is, consult the docs for your web server.\nYour web root directory may vary depending on your operating system, but if you are using Apache it is typically located at:
\n\nOnce you have finished installing Apache navigate to http://localhost/extjs/index.html in your browser. If an Ext JS 4 welcome page appears, you are all set.
\n\nAlthough not being mandatory, all suggestions listed below should be considered as best-practice guidelines to keep your application well organized, extensible and maintainable.\nThe following is the recommended directory structure for an Ext JS application:
\n\n- appname\n - app\n - namespace\n - Class1.js\n - Class2.js\n - ...\n - extjs\n - resources\n - css\n - images\n - ...\n - app.js\n - index.html\nappname is a directory that contains all your application's source filesapp contains all your classes, the naming style of which should follow the convention listed in the Class System guideextjs contains the Ext JS 4 SDK filesresources contains additional CSS and image files which are responsible for the look and feel of the application, as well as other static resources (XML, JSON, etc.)index.html is the entry-point HTML documentapp.js contains your application's logicDon't worry about creating all those directories at the moment. For now lets just focus on creating the minimum amount of code necessary to get an Ext JS application up and running.\nTo do this we'll create a basic \"hello world\" Ext JS application called \"Hello Ext\". First, create the following directory and files in your web root directory.
\n\n- helloext\n - app.js\n - index.html\nThen unzip the Ext JS 4 SDK to a directory named extjs in the helloext directory
A typical Ext JS application is contained in a single HTML document - index.html. Open index.html and insert the following html code:
<html>\n<head>\n <title>Hello Ext</title>\n\n <link rel=\"stylesheet\" type=\"text/css\" href=\"extjs/resources/css/ext-all.css\">\n <script type=\"text/javascript\" src=\"extjs/ext-debug.js\"></script>\n <script type=\"text/javascript\" src=\"app.js\"></script>\n</head>\n<body></body>\n</html>\nextjs/resources/css/ext-all.css contains all styling information needed for the whole frameworkextjs/ext-debug.js contains a minimal set of Ext JS 4 Core library classesapp.js will contain your application codeNow you're ready to write your application code. Open app.js and insert the following JavaScript code:
\n\nExt.application({\n name: 'HelloExt',\n launch: function() {\n Ext.create('Ext.container.Viewport', {\n layout: 'fit',\n items: [\n {\n title: 'Hello Ext',\n html : 'Hello! Welcome to Ext JS.'\n }\n ]\n });\n }\n});\nNow open your browser and navigate to http://localhost/helloext/index.html. You should see a panel with a title bar containing the text \"Hello Ext\" and the \"welcome\" message in the panel's body area.
\n\nOpen the Chrome Developer Tools and click on the Console option. Now refresh the Hello Ext application. You should see a warning in the console that looks like this:
\n\n
Ext JS 4 comes with a system for dynamically loading only the JavaScript resources necessary to run your app.\nIn our example Ext.create creates an instance of Ext.container.Viewport. When Ext.create is called the loader will first check to see if Ext.container.Viewport has been defined.\nIf it is undefined the loader will try to load the JavaScript file that contains the code for Ext.container.Viewport before instantiating the viewport object. In our example the Viewport.js file gets loaded successfully, but the loader detects\nthat files are being loaded in a less-than optimal manner. Since we are loading the Viewport.js file only when an instance of Ext.container.Viewport is requested, execution of the code is stopped until that file has been loaded successfully, causing a short delay.\nThis delay would be compounded if we had several calls to Ext.create, because the application would wait for each file to load before requesting the next one.
To fix this, we can add this one line of code above the call to Ext.application:
Ext.require('Ext.container.Viewport');
This will ensure that the file containing the code for Ext.container.Viewport is loaded before the application runs. You should no longer see the Ext.Loader warning when you refresh the page.
When you unzip the Ext JS 4 download, you will see the following files:
\n\next-debug.js - This file is only for use during development. It provides the minimum number of core Ext JS classes needed to get up and running. Any additional classes should be dynamically loaded as separate files as demonstrated above.
ext.js - same as ext-debug.js but minified for use in production. Meant to be used in combination with your application's app-all.js file. (see section 3)
ext-all-debug.js - This file contains the entire Ext JS library. This can be helpful for shortening your initial learning curve, however ext-debug.js is preferred in most cases for actual application development.
ext-all.js - This is a minified version of ext-all-debug.js that can be used in production environments, however, it is not recommended since most applications will not make use of all the classes that it contains. Instead it is recommended that you create a custom build for your production environment as described in section 3.
The newly introduced Sencha SDK Tools (download here) makes deployment of any Ext JS 4 application easier than ever. The tools allow you to generate a manifest of all JavaScript dependencies in the form of a JSB3 (JSBuilder file format) file, and create a custom build containing only the code that your application needs.
\n\nOnce you've installed the SDK Tools, open a terminal window and navigate into your application's directory.
\n\ncd path/to/web/root/helloext\nFrom here you only need to run a couple of simple commands. The first one generates a JSB3 file:
\n\nsencha create jsb -a index.html -p app.jsb3\nFor applications built on top of a dynamic server-side language like PHP, Ruby, ASP, etc., you can simply replace index.html with the actual URL of your application:
sencha create jsb -a http://localhost/helloext/index.html -p app.jsb3\nThis scans your index.html file for all framework and application files that are actually used by the app, and then creates a JSB file called app.jsb3. Generating the JSB3 first gives us a chance to modify the generated app.jsb3 before building - this can be helpful if you have custom resources to copy, but in most cases we can immediately proceed to build the application with the second command:
sencha build -p app.jsb3 -d .\nThis creates 2 files based on the JSB3 file:
\n\nall-classes.js - This file contains all of your application's classes. It is not minified so is very useful for debugging problems with your built application. In our example this file is empty because our \"Hello Ext\" application does not contain any classes.
app-all.js - This file is a minimized build of your application plus all of the Ext JS classes required to run it. It is the minified and production-ready version of all-classes.js + app.js.
An Ext JS application will need a separate index.html for the production version of the app. You will typically handle this in your build process or server side logic, but for now let's just create a new file in the helloext directory called index-prod.html:
<html>\n<head>\n <title>Hello Ext</title>\n\n <link rel=\"stylesheet\" type=\"text/css\" href=\"extjs/resources/css/ext-all.css\">\n <script type=\"text/javascript\" src=\"extjs/ext-debug.js\"></script>\n <script type=\"text/javascript\" src=\"app-all.js\"></script>\n</head>\n<body></body>\n</html>\nNotice that ext-debug.js has been replaced with ext.js, and app.js has been replaced with app-all.js. If you navigate to http://localhost/helloext/index-prod.html in your browser, you should see the production version of the \"Hello Ext\" application.