The Pin Chases is an AJAX application that is enable by the Google Web Toolkit (GWT). It is backed by a servlet (ala GWT's RPC) that performs various functions including session tracking and intefaces to the back end. The Servlet is subclassed from the GWT API.

The backing store is XML files which are massaged by the XStream library (codehause). There is a companion application (also GWT) that allows me to create new ships and maintain existing ones. (BTW, this app is not deployed so don't bother looking for it).