This document provides information about a Women Techmakers event in Minneapolis on March 22, 2014. It discusses prerequisites for installing Groovy and Grails, as well as the goals of the Women Techmakers organization, which are education, networking, and professional development. The document also summarizes Groovy, Grails, Gradle, Griffon, and Spock frameworks and provides recommendations for learning more about these frameworks.

1. Women Techmakers: Minneapolis
Minneapolis, MN
March 22, 2014

2.  Prerequisites
 Java jdk
 try ‘java –version’ to see if it’s already installed
 http://www.grails.org/Installation
 To Install Groovy and Grails:
 Gvmtool.net
 curl –s get.gvmtool.net | bash
 gvm install groovy
 gvm install grails
 gvm use grails 2.3.4

3.  An organization for the support of women in
the Gr8 stack community
 Goals:
 Education
 Networking
 Professional Development
 Contact Us
 @Gr8Ladies on twitter
 Gr8Ladies.org
 LinkedIn, Facebook search Gr8Ladies
 Contribute to our website via GitHub

4.  Groovy – the language
 Grails – MVC framework
 Gradle –build automation tool
 Used to build Android Apps
 Griffon – desktop app framework
 Spock – testing framework
 Many other minor frameworks and
development tools

5. Image via: http://blogs.vitoria-gasteiz.org/ti/2010/05/31/full-stack/

6.  Dynamic compiled language
 Flexible
 optional typing
 default scope
 optional getters/setters
 Rapid Development
 Integrates with existing JAVA libraries and
infrastructure
 #groovylang

7.  In Java,
 In Groovy,

8.  Elvis Operator ?:
 In PHP:
 In Groovy:

9.  Ranges
 A collection of numbers defined by boundaries
 Spread dot
 Applies a function to every element of a collection
and returns the result

10.  Null safe
 user?.chapter?.name?.toUpperCase()
 will return null if user or chapter is null and will not
return an error

11.  Groovy Truth
 Null, empty string, empty set, and 0 are all false!

12. Image via: http://blogs.vitoria-gasteiz.org/ti/2010/05/31/full-stack/

13.  MVC framework
 similar to Symphony in PHP, Django in Python, or
Ruby on Rails
 Convention over configuration
 #grailsfw

14. image from: http://www.mathiasbosman.be/wp-
content/uploads/2014/02/mvc_role_diagram.png

16.  Domain Classes
 Grails Object Relationship
Mapping(GORM)
 Uses Hibernate
 Class names map to tables
 Field names map to
columns
 Dynamic finders
 User.findAllByGenderAnd
ChapterIsNotNull(‘F’)
 Events
 beforeInsert, afterUpdate,
beforeDelete
 Alternatives
 Mongo and Redis

17.  Mapped to urls by
name
 /user/list
UserController.list()
 Url Parameters map
to controller
 /user/show/id
UserController.sho
w(id)

18.  GSP (Groovy Server
Page)
 Directory structure by
convention
 UserController.list()
renders
/views/user/list.gsp
 Special tags for forms,
links, looping and other
tasks
 Reference model data
by ${model.attribute}

19.  Lots of Options for writing tests
 Spock (default)
 JUnit
 Geb

20. • www.gebish.org
• http://docs.spockframework.org/en/spock-0.7-groovy-
2.0/
• For Grails, in BuildConfig.groovy:
dependencies {
test "org.seleniumhq.selenium:selenium-support:2.40.0"
test "org.seleniumhq.selenium:selenium-firefox-driver:2.40.0"
test "org.gebish:geb-spock:0.9.2”
}
plugins {
test ":geb:0.9.2"
compile ":remote-control:1.4“ // For accessing the context of the
// grails app from tests
// Spock is already included in Grails 2.3.6
}

21. package com.allison.pages
import geb.Page
class EmployeeListPage extends Page {
// the link that is navigated to
// on the 'to' call
static url = "employee/list"
// the closure that is verified on
// the 'at' call
static at = {
pageTitle.text() == 'Employee List Page'
}
// The navigator objects
static content = {
pageTitle(wait: true) { $('h2.title') }
employeeLink(wait: true, to: EmployeeShowPage)
{ id ->
$('a.employeeLink', 'id': "${id}")
}
}
// It is good practice to wrap all the
// navigator objects in methods
boolean employeeLinkIsPresent(Long id) {
employeeLink(id).isDisplayed()
}
EmployeeShowPage clickEmployeeLink(Long id) {
employeeLink(id).click()
return browser.page
}
}
<html>
<head>
<title>Employee</title>
</head>
<body>
<h2 class="title">Employee List Page</h2>
<ul>
<li>
<a href="/gebDemo/employee/show/1" id="1”
class="employeeLink"> Alice LastName </a>
</li>
<li>
<a href="/gebDemo/employee/show/2" id="2”
class="employeeLink"> Bob LastName2 </a>
</li>
<li>
<a href="/gebDemo/employee/show/3" id="3”
class="employeeLink"> Charles LastName3 </a>
</li>
</ul>
</body>
</html>

22. package com.allison.functional
import com.allison.pages.EmployeeListPage
import com.allison.remote.EmployeeRemoteControl
import geb.spock.GebReportingSpec
class firstSpec extends GebReportingSpec {
EmployeeRemoteControl remote =
new EmployeeRemoteControl()
Long employeeId_1
Long employeeId_2
Long employeeId_3
def setup() {
EmployeeRemoteControl remote =
new EmployeeRemoteControl()
employeeId_1 =
remote.createEmployee('Alice', 'LastName')
employeeId_2 =
remote.createEmployee('Bob', 'LastName2')
employeeId_3 =
remote.createEmployee('Charles', 'LastName3')
}
CONTINUED 
def 'A descriptive name for the feature'() {
given: 'Setup stuff'
// Can be blank
when: 'The employee list page is navigated to'
EmployeeListPage employeeListPage =
to EmployeeListPage
then: 'The employee list page header is displayed'
assert at(EmployeeListPage) // All statements in a
// then-block are implicitly
// asserted
and: 'The employee is listed'
assert employeeListPage.employeeLinkIsPresent(
employeeId_1)
when: 'The employee is clicked'
employeeListPage.clickEmployeeLink(employeeId_1)
then: 'At the show employee page'
assert at(EmployeeShowPage)
}
def cleanup() {
remote.deleteEmployee(employeeId_1)
remote.deleteEmployee(employeeId_2)
remote.deleteEmployee(employeeId_3)
}
}

23.  GVM!
 Groovy enVironment Manager
 curl –s get.gvmtool.net | bash
 gvm install groovy
 gvm install grails
 Use grails 2.3.4
 Choose an IDE
 IntelliJ
 Eclipse
 Netbeans

24.  grails create-app appName
 auto generates app structure
 grails create-domain-class User
 Creates domain class and test file
 grails generate-all appName.User
 Auto generates views and controllers based on the
properties of the domain class

25.  Grails war
 Defaults to target/appName-0.1.war
 Deploy to JVM
 Example via Amazon ElasticBeanstalk

26.  Making Java Groovy – Ken Kousen
 Email jstrater@gr8ladies.org for coupon code
 Programming Grails – Bert Beckwith (O’reilly
animal book)
 Groovy In Action - Dierk Koenig with Andrew
Glover, Paul King, Guillaume Laforge and Jon
Skeet
 Many Tutorials available on grails.org

27.  Come to Groovy Users of Minnesota(GUM)
every second Tuesday of the month at Smart
Things
 Join Gr8Ladies for hack sessions and contribute
to the gr8ladies website on github
 Gr8Ladies.org or @Gr8Ladies on twitter