What is a Zimlet

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A Zimlet is a “zipped” bundle of content that is deployed to the ZCS server by the Zimlet management tool. The files comprising the Zimlet bundle enable the integration of the ZCS platform with disparate information systems and content. These files are enumerated below. Note that the “<zimlet>” label in descriptions below would be replaced with the name of the actual Zimlet. The naming convention is the reversed domain name of the author’s company where the “.”s in the domain name are replaced by “_”s. For example, if the author’s company is acme.com and the Zimlet name is Maps, then the fully qualified name would be com_acme_Maps.

  • <zimlet>.xml – The Zimlet definition file. This is the most important file in the Zimlet bundle. It specifies the behavior of the Zimlet. In fact, it is possible to fully specify this behavior in the Zimlet definition file without the need for writing any client side JavaScript code. This file is required for all Zimlet implementations.
  • <zimlet>.js [optional] – While it is possible to completely define a Zimlet declaratively within the Zimlet description file, in many instances it may desired to provide JavaScript implementation for some or all of the Zimlet functions. The Zimlet JavaScript class provides the base class whose methods may be overridden to provide custom implementations for various Zimlet functions (see section for a full description of the Zimlet base class). This file is only required for those Zimlets requiring the extension of the AJAX client with custom JavaScript code. <zimlet> can actually be any name though we recommend using the convention above.
  • <zimlet>.jsp [optional] – This file contains optional JSP code to implement connectivity, data retrieval, or additional server-side data functionality. Only Zimlets requiring custom server side implementations need provide a JSP implementation. The Zimlet infrastructure comes with a generic proxy servlet rooted at “/service/proxy” for making arbitrary calls to external systems or services. See section 6 for more information.
  • <zimlet>.properties [optional] - This is the fallback Zimlet message property file. By using Java property files, Zimlets are easily Localizable.
  • config_template.xml [optional] - This a template file for the Zimlet’s configuration properties for the Zimlet. See section 8 for more information

In addition, the Zimlet bundle may also include:

  • Additional supporting JavaScript files
  • A Java class that implements the com.zimbra.cs.zimlet.ZimletHandler interface to help match Zimlet content objects for server-side indexing (see section for more information)
  • Additional properties files for the locales for which the Zimlet has been localized.
  • Additional supporting files such as CSS, HTML, image files, etc.
Verified Against: Date Created: 7/15/2009
Article ID: https://wiki.zimbra.com/index.php?title=What_is_a_Zimlet Date Modified: 2009-08-17



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