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title: Hello Edgent!

Edgent's pure Java implementation is a powerful feature which allows it to be run on the majority of JVM-compatible systems. It also has the added benefit of enabling the developer to develop applications entirely within the Eclipse and IntelliJ ecosystems. For the purposes of this recipe, it will be assumed that the developer is using Eclipse. To begin the Hello Edgent recipe, create a new project and import the necessary libraries as outlined in the Getting started guide. Next, write the following template application:

public static void main(String[] args) {

    DirectProvider dp = new DirectProvider();

    Topology top = dp.newTopology();
}

The DirectProvider is an object which allows the user to submit and run the final application. It also creates the Topology object, which gives the developer the ability to define a stream of strings.

Using Topology.strings()

The primary abstraction in Edgent is the TStream. A TStream represents the flow of data in an Edgent application; for example, the periodic floating point readings from a temperature sensor. The data items which are sent through a TStream are Java objects — in the “Hello Edgent!” example, we are sending two strings. There are a number of ways to create a TStream, and Topology.strings() is the simplest. The user specifies a number of strings which will be used as the stream's data items.

public static void main(String[] args) {

    DirectProvider dp = new DirectProvider();

    Topology top = dp.newTopology();

    TStream<String> helloStream = top.strings("Hello", "Edgent!");
}

The helloStream stream is created, and the “Hello” and “Edgent!” strings will be sent as its two data items.

Printing to output

TStream.print() can be used to print the data items of a stream to standard output by invoking the toString() method of each data item. In this case the data items are already strings, but in principle TStream.print() can be called on any stream, regardless of the datatype carried by the stream.

public static void main(String[] args) {

    DirectProvider dp = new DirectProvider();

    Topology top = dp.newTopology();

    TStream<String> helloStream = top.strings("Hello", "Edgent!");

	helloStream.print();
}

Submitting the application

The only remaining step is to submit the application, which is performed by the DirectProvider. Submitting an Edgent application initializes the threads which execute the Topology, and begins processing its data sources.

public static void main(String[] args) {

    DirectProvider dp = new DirectProvider();

    Topology top = dp.newTopology();

    TStream<String> helloStream = top.strings("Hello", "Edgent!");

    helloStream.print();

    dp.submit(top);
}

After running the application, the output is “Hello Edgent!”:

Hello
Edgent!