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- ExtJS 6 – So what’s new? - October 29, 2015
You probably noticed that Sencha updated Ext JS to 6.0.0 version from 5.1.xx.
I’ts really a big big updated. So here are some key new features.
ExtJS and Sencha Touch are one now
I would say the most important thing about this update is the merge of ExtJS and Sencha Touch. For those who don’t know Sencha Touch is a Javascript framework designed for mobile application development.
Today responsive is a must in web development. Same is with business applications, people are living fast today. We are reading and working from buss stations, taxi, from our beds, anyplace. People are using smartphones and tablets more than ever.
Sencha made Sencha touch a few years ago as a response to mobile so many companies that are using ExtJS started to use Sench touch.
There are few problems in this approach
- Sencha touch is not ExtJS, it lacks some of the features
- Your are developing 2 applications, one for mobile, one for desktop
- Your are using 2 frameworks so you need to learn more, to write more etc
ExtJS 6 solve those problems because it’s one multipurpose framework. Write once, run everywhere.
Ext JS 6 Toolkits
Toolkits are packages containing only visual parts of application like grids, buttons, panels etc. ExtJS 6 has 2 toolkits: modern and classic.
Modern toolkit contains ExtJS components and Sencha touch components are packed in classic toolkit. You can choose toolkit in app.json or event chose themes for separate toolkits.
It’s important to mention that ExtJS 6 has a common core package which contains packages like Ext.direct, Ext.data, Ext.app and others. So you can now for example use viewControllers and viewModels in applications that will run on mobile. That was now possible in the past.
Sench CMD 6.0.x
With ExtJS 6 we got a whole new sencha cmd! Cmd is now completely rebuilt.
We don’t need a ton of damn dependencies like ruby for compas, java etc to install and run cmd.
Sencha cmd now comes with Java JRE inside so simply download->instal->next->next->next and voila.
New sass compiler – ExtJS 6 Fashion
Fashion is new sass compiler. It’s similar to compass but with a few life changing updates. It runs on Javascript so in combination with PhatomJS it can build css files from sass. That means no more Ruby.
But the best thing are live updates. You can load sass files into browser and edit them..app watch command will react to file changes and update application instant.
Take a look this ExtJS fashion video showcase below.
Triton theme!
Yes we have a new theme and it’s flat, clean and modern.
It uses font icons from Font Awesome which is cool because we have an army of icons available. It’s really a one nice theme as you can see on ExtJS 6 examples.
Other important ExtJS 6 updates
Grids are becoming Excel! We can now mark cells like in excel by dragging the corner selection. We have some new and simplified Excel spreadsheet exporter plugin.
ExtJS 6 Premium package contains upgraded pivot grid package with some new options.
3D charts are more robust.
I like the most new layout xtype: responsivecolumn.
Responsive layout type supports nice way to resize and arrange layout parts differently on small and big screens but without @media queries (not supported in IE 8).
More about responsivecolumn. Take a look also on treelist and other new components.
You can download framework here and read ExtJS 6 documentation here.
In the future we will base our blog posts mostly on ExtJS 6 examples because we think it’s the way to go with ExtJS.