Introduction to Value Processing

This section only applies to input components which indicate that data should be stored persistently, i.e. if the component's SiteArchitect and/or ContentCreator implementations provide the following aspects: SiteArchitect: ValueHolder (see Swing Gadget Aspects) ContentCreator: SerializingValueHolder (see Web Gadget Aspects)

Depending on their functional requirements, custom FirstSpirit gadgets may store and restore data which was entered by users or sourced otherwise. Toward this end, FirstSpirit provides a framework which allows gadget values to be stored and restored.

The framework consists of multiple components:

• Component Value Type
  is used to represent the data and provide additional functionality while directly working on such data (i.e. in conjunction with SiteArchitect and ContentCreator gadgets). This type may be a simple (i.e. String or Number), a complex (i.e. a list or a map), or an encapsulating object type.
  Many of the following framework components are parameterized with this value type, signified in this documentation and the API documentation as <T>.
• Value Engineer
  is used during store and restore operations of gadget values and translates data from a component object value into a storable persistence format and vice versa.
• Value Engineer Factory
  is used to create a value engineer object, optionally providing that object with a pre-configured context object.
• Value Engineer Aspects
  are used to support additional, optional functionality related to the value engineer.