FDC3 Workbench - developer example application

[kriswest]

Enhancement Request

Use Case:

When developing an FDC3 integration one of the first things developers do is to implement a test application to try out the API calls and to give them something to test their actual application against. Such development is usually throw-away and includes only the bare minimum that they need.

The FDC3 workbench is intended to replace such test apps by providing a ready-made 'workbench' application that makes it easy to create contexts, raise intents and work with channels, whilst also providing easy access to code snippets to replicate each action in your own implementation. The FDC3 Workbench may also be used as a reference implementation of a client application against which to test desktop agent implementations.

By open-sourcing the app as part of the FDC3 repository a wider portion of the community can benefit from the workbench and will be able to participate in onward development & maintaince.

Workflow Examples

• An app developer wishes to develop interop features for their app to:
  • receive context from other applications
    • The workbench application should allow you to:
      • select and customize a context template or create a custom context object
      • join channels and broadcast that object
      • observe that their application receives and correctly handles the context
  • broadcast context to other applications
    • The workbench application should allow you to:
      • add listeners for both specific and all contexts
      • join channels
      • observe context objects received by each listener
  • raise intents for other applications to resolve
    • The workbench application should allow you to:
      • select and customize a context template or create a custom context object
      • select or enter a custom intent
      • raise that intent via the desktop agent
  • listen for intents raised by other applications
    • The workbench application should allow you to:
      • select or enter a custom intent
      • add intent listeners for multiple events
      • observe context objects received by each intent listener
• A desktop developer wish to test the behaviour or their desktop agent implementation:
  • The workbench application should facilitate the use of as much of the FDC3 Desktop Agent API as possible, allowing the behaviour of desktop agents to be tested and compared to compliance information provided in the FDC3 specification.

Additional Information

The FDC3 workbench is being contributed into the FDC3 repository to:

• facilitate use by the widest possible portion of the FDC3 community
• encourage maintenance of the workbench application alongside the FDC3 standard itself, as the value of the workbench is dependent on compatibility with the standard.

The workbench will be added to a top-level /toolbox directory in the repository ('FDC3 Explained' is also being contributed to that directory, see #367)