Table of contents
1.
Introduction
2.
Toolchain
3.
Installing Java SDK
3.1.
Windows
3.2.
Linux
4.
Installing a Web Server
4.1.
Installing Apache Tomcat
5.
Installing the Eclipse IDE and Plugin
5.1.
Installing the Eclipse IDE for Windows
5.2.
Installing the Eclipse IDE for Linux / OS X / UNIX
6.
Frequently Asked Questions
6.1.
What is the Vaadin Board Framework?
6.2.
How To Install Add-ons?
6.3.
Can Vaadin be used to create PWAs?
7.
Conclusion
Last Updated: Mar 27, 2024

Vaadin-Environment Setup

Author Ayush Tiwari
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Introduction

Virtually any development environment that supports the Java SDK and deploys to a Java Servlet container can be used to create Vaadin applications. Vaadin can be used with any Java IDE or even without one at all. Along with IntelliJ IDEA, Vaadin also offers specialized support for the Eclipse and NetBeans IDEs.
 

Vaadin

It can become tiresome to manually manage Vaadin and other Java libraries, so it is recommended to use a build system that handles dependencies automatically. Vaadin can be used with any build or dependency management system that can access Maven repositories, such as Ivy or Gradle, in addition to Maven. It is distributed in the Maven central repository. Let's look at the basic Vaadin Environment Setup stepwise.

Toolchain

The reference development environment is presented in this section. Vaadin supports a wide range of tools, allowing you to use virtually any IDE to write code, virtually any Java web server to deploy the application, most web browsers to use it, and any Java-compatible operating system platform.

In this example, we use the following toolchain:

  1. Windows, Linux, or Mac OS 
  2. Oracle Java SE 8
  3. Eclipse IDE for Java EE Developers
  4. Apache Tomcat 8.0 (Core)
  5. Chrome browser
  6. Vaadin Framework
     

Although the reference toolchain mentioned above is a good choice, you can use virtually any tools you are familiar with. For Vaadin development, we advise using Java 8, but you must ensure that your entire toolchain is compatible. 

The development toolchain is shown in Development Toolchain and Process. Your application is created as an Eclipse project. The Vaadin libraries must be included in the project along with your source code. Additionally, project-specific themes may be included.

Before using a project, you must compile and deploy it to a web container. The Web Tools Platform (WTP) for Eclipse, which enables automatic deployment of web applications from Eclipse, can be used to deploy a project. It is a component of the Eclipse EE package. By producing a web application archive (WAR) and deploying it to the web container, you can manually deploy a project for Vaadin Environment Setup.

Installing Java SDK

Vaadin, as well as any Java IDE, both require a Java SDK. Java 8 is necessary for Vaadin Framework 8. For proper server push support with WebSockets, Java EE 7 is necessary.

Vaadin employs JVM. Therefore, JDK 8 must be used for your local development environment. If you want to download and install JDK 8 or a later version, please visit Oracle's official website. Java may need its environment variables set so that it can function properly. You can check your installation in Windows/Linux by typing java –version in the command prompt/terminal, which will output the version of java that is currently installed on your system.

java--version command

Windows

Follow the following steps:
🍁 Download Oracle Java from here.

🍁 Install the Java SDK by running the installer. The default options are fine.

Linux

The majority of Linux systems either come with JDK already installed or let you add it using a package management system. But take note that the default Java implementation there is OpenJDK. We don't particularly support it even though it is known to have worked with the Vaadin Framework and possibly the development toolchain to Vaadin Environment Setup.

You might need to download Java JDK 8 depending on your OS distribution:

🍁 Visit http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/java/javase/downloads/ to download Oracle Java SE 8.0.

🍁 It should be unzipped in a suitable base directory, like /opt. Enter (either as root or with sudo in Linux): For Java SDK:

installing command

A system-wide setting could also be made in a file like /etc/bash.bashrc, /etc/profile, or a similar file. You might want to set those up in the path if you install Apache Ant or Maven.

You must open a new shell window in order to change settings in a bashrc file. You must log into the system to make changes to a profile file. Of course, you can also execute the commands in the active shell.

Installing a Web Server

Any Java servlet container that supports at least Servlet API 3.0 can run Vaadin applications. Utilizing communication channels like WebSocket, made possible by features in some of the newest servers, can be advantageous for server push. At the very least, Apache TomEE Web Profile, Glassfish, and Wildfly are advised for Java EE containers.

We discuss server installation prior to the IDEs because some Java IDEs integrate with servers.

A development server is also included in some IDE bundles; the NetBeans IDE, for instance, comes with GlassFish and Apache Tomcat to Vaadin Environment Setup.

Another option is to use a Maven dependency to install a development server and then let the IDE manage it through Maven executions.

Installing Apache Tomcat

A Java web server that is suitable for both development and production is Apache Tomcat. It can be installed in a variety of ways, but in this case, we'll just decompress the installation package.

Installing Apache Tomcat with user permissions is recommended. You will be using Eclipse or another IDE with user permissions while developing, but in order to deploy web applications to a Tomcat server that is installed system-wide, you must have administrator or root permissions.

 

Get the installation package here:

From http://tomcat.apache.org/, download Apache Tomcat 8.0 (Core Binary Distribution).

To a suitable target directory, such as C: dev (Windows) or /opt, decompress the Apache Tomcat package (Linux or Mac OS X). Both C: deapache-tomcat-8.0.x and /opt/apache-tomcat-8.0.x will function as the Apache Tomcat home directory.

Stop launching the server. The IDE will control starting and stopping the server if you use an IDE integration.

Must Read Apache Server

Installing the Eclipse IDE and Plugin

Using the Vaadin Plugin for Eclipse is extremely helpful if you're using the Eclipse IDE. New Vaadin-based projects, themes, client-side widgets, and widget sets can all be created using the plugin's wizards. Keep in mind that Vaadin projects can also be created in Eclipse as Maven projects.

Installing both the Eclipse IDE and the Vaadin Plugin for Eclipse is necessary to use the IDE for Vaadin development. It is advised that you set up a web server in Eclipse as well. The server can then be used to run the Vaadin applications you develop.

Note: A visual design tool for experienced developers is Vaadin Designer. Declarative designs can be created quickly and easily using it. Additionally useful as a tool for sketching, it makes learning about Vaadin layouts and components simple.

Installing the Eclipse IDE for Windows

🍁 Visit http://www.eclipse.org/downloads/ to get the Eclipse IDE for Java EE Developers.
 

🍁 Eclipse IDE package should be decompressed to an appropriate directory. You are free to choose any directory and use any ZIP decompressor, but in this example, we simply double-click the ZIP file and choose the "Extract all files" task from the Windows compressed folder task to decompress it. In our installation example, the target directory is C:\dev.

Installing the Eclipse IDE for Linux / OS X / UNIX

In Linux and other UNIX variants, we advise the manual installation of Eclipse. It might be accessible from a package repository, but using such an installation could lead to issues when trying to install plug-ins.

Installing Eclipse can be done as follows:

🍁 Visit http://www.eclipse.org/downloads/ to get the Eclipse IDE for Java EE Developers.
 

🍁 Eclipse's package should be decompressed into an appropriate base directory. Make sure there isn't an outdated Eclipse installation in the target directory. Eclipse probably becomes unusable if a new version is installed on top of an older one.
 

🍁 In order to make installing plug-ins easier, Eclipse should typically be installed as a regular user.
Put in: to install the package.

install package command
 

🍁 If you want to make it possible to launch Eclipse from the command line, you must either add the Eclipse installation directory to the user's or system's PATH variable, and create a symbolic link to the executable, or write a script to do.
 

Use an Eclipse version that is accessible through your operating system's package management system as an alternative to the above procedure. It is not advised, though, as you will need to write access to the Eclipse installation directory to install Eclipse plugins and you risk running into compatibility problems with Eclipse plugins set up by the operating system's package management.

Frequently Asked Questions

FAQs

What is the Vaadin Board Framework?

Vaadin Flow is a Java web framework that can be used to create web apps and websites. The programming approach of Vaadin Flow enables developers to use Java as the programming language for developing User Interfaces (UIs) without needing to use HTML or JavaScript directly.

How To Install Add-ons?

Installing add-ons from the Vaadin Directory is as simple as adding a Maven or Ivy dependency or downloading the JAR file and dumping it in the project's web library folder.

Can Vaadin be used to create PWAs?

Yes. By default, Vaadin applications are progressive web apps. For an offline fallback page, the starters create a manifest file and a service worker. Colors, icons, and the offline page can all be customized.

Conclusion

Congratulations on finishing the blog! We have discussed the Vaadin Environment Setup.

We looked at all the installations one by one for Vaadin Environment Setup.

We recommend you to visit our articles on different topics of Vaadin, such as

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