Develop Reference

Which powerfull tools are used to create website and could GWT and GXT work ?

So I started working this year after finished studying last year. I have been exposed to so many things in the working environment. Suck as Maven, GWT and Hibernate.
Now I got this side project in which I just need to create a simple website which would bassically just display some information and contacting details.
So I was wondering if HTML5 CSS and JavaScript is still the way to go and if there are not powerfull frameworks in which could you help me do animations and graphics much easier.
Also if you know GWT and GXT would it be a bad idea to create a visually apealing website using these frameworks.
Thank you so much for reading
Have a nice day

Objective: Create a simple website which would basically just display some information and contacting details.
GXT:
GXT is built on GWT.
Go for GXT when you are in need of rich set of widgets (it is a very large set of collection) out of the box. Have a look on the following link where GXT has showcased the different widgets
http://examples.sencha.com/gxt/4.0.0/
GWT:
GWT will be having minimal set of widgets when compared to GXT. Have a look on the different widgets which are provided out of the box. http://samples.gwtproject.org/samples/Showcase/Showcase.html
Javascript Animation framework:
There are bunch of javascript libraries/frameworks for animation, choose one which is most appropriate to your work. Have a look on the following link.
https://www.javascripting.com/animation/
Conclusion:
Consider the following before finalizing on a framework
Framework which is having more out of the box components which matches the requirement.
Framework which is more stable
Framework which is having more support on the internet, such as forums, blogs.
Happy Coding!!

Thumbnail image of Links in my Community page

I have been searching hard on when a user pastes a link in the community page, and posts it. Then just below the link - a small image of the site and brief description of the site appears.
This is similar to when you post a link in Linkedin, and when you post it, then in the post automatically a small image of the website that this link points to appears, and also a brief descritption of the site, which I believe is the title.
I have searched a lot, but could not find a place to start on how to do this. If anyone can give me a starting point, it would be highly appreciated.
Best Regards,

This really would be highly valuable for all sorts of applications. Doing a quick SO and Google search, I found one service that has an API for this: https://www.url2png.com.
I'm not sure, but it would seem that this type of function would have to be done backend with software installed on your server. This makes sense as we're working with rendering images; and current browsers (through Javascript or APIs) don't yet seem to have the ability to render images. (Anyone provide links to documentation in the comments if I'm wrong about this?)
Update
Here's another one I found that has command-line open-source code: http://cutycapt.sourceforge.net/

Creating a printable/downloadable PDF of a web application

I have been searching for an answer to this problem now for several weeks. I also previously tried to research this a few years ago to no avail.
Problem Summary:
My company has developed a web-based data analytics suite for a major beverage distributor. They have recently asked for a feature that allows the user to print or download a visually pleasing version of the rendered app as a PDF. I have had no luck in finding a solid, controllable, or reliable method to do this. I was hoping the stack community might be able to point me in the right direction.
Current Tech Stack:
Plack servers
Perl base on the Dancer framework
Standard web dev front-ends: HTML5, CSS3, Javascript, Jquery/UI
Client is using IE9/10 and Chrome.
Attempted Solutions Summary:
Obviously I started with the window.print() and tried to control what printed using classes and a specialized print.css but the output was still awful.
I looked in to pdfmachine and pdfbox and even contacted Adobe's acrobat development team directly to see if they had an out of the box solution our company could purchase. I was informed that such a product would be counter intuitive to their desired business model of putting an acrobat subscription on each client computer rather than a single server side application.
I have extensively searched the stack articles but did not feel that the articles I found covered what I was looking for.
At present, I am all out of ideas and am hoping somebody out there has had better luck at this than I have.
tl;dr = I need a pdf version of the rendered output of a complex reporting app.
Thanks for your time stack, I appreciate it.

A solution I have used in the past is to use PhantomJS running on a server to generate the PDF for download/email. Usually if the content is sensitive the server (that handles authentication) would provide a single use viewing token that is then passed to a PhantomJS process. It loads the URL with the viewing token then saves as a PDF.
Further info on Phantoms screen cap API can be found here on GitHub.
https://github.com/ariya/phantomjs/wiki/Screen-Capture

Is it something you can create in Perl using PDF::API2 or PDF::Create? You can load and modify and existing PDF (handy if you want standard headers and footers), and then insert the relevant content. The learning curve can be a bit steep, but simple reports should be easy enough.
See PDF::TextBlock and PDF::Table too - they are great little helpers.

Consider this service http://pdfmyurl.com/ . I try to use many perl modules, but they dont satisfy my problems.

Firefox extension that interacts with existing page content

I am not a web programming expert but I would like to create a Firefox extension that rewrites pages' html and javascript code. This is a personal project so I can take my time and learn things as I go.
I haven't been able to locate a tutorial or existing extension that does both tasks.
Would you be able to point me in the right direction?
Thanks you so much!
-CxT

You're trying to accomplish two different things. My advice is to learn to do both independently. For extensions, these are great tutorials:
https://developer.mozilla.org/en/building_an_extension
http://www.rietta.com/firefox/Tutorial/overview.html
For "rewriting" a pages html, css, js:
http://ejohn.org/blog/hacking-digg-with-firebug-and-jquery/
Anything you don't understand in any of the tutorials, either google or ask here.
Enjoy!

Any Issues with ScriptCalendar

In looking for a javascript based events calendar (for displaying events on a calendar) and came across ScriptCalendar which seems pretty good, but their SEO tactics seem to be somewhat suspect. Download it and look at the scmrkt0912.htm file to see what I mean.
Has anyone used this Calendar, are there any comments on how good it is?

I think it's awesome. If you need an event calendar and you don't have server side scripting like ASP.NET or PHP it's perfect. It's javascript and can be hosted on a plain html website. (FYI: There is code available on the website that allows you to use it ASP.NET or PHP).
It may not be the best looking website out there, but perhaps you need to do something other a cursory look at it. The website allows to download a demo version of the calendar that has some limitations. But, there is complete transparency with the demo. It functions as the website describes. You can see all functionality for yourself.
I recommend getting the demo if you are interested in an event calendar.