This first chapter serves as the foundations for a journey full of interesting technologies, thrilling challenges, and useful code. If you are reading this book, the chances that you have coded a Vaadin application before are high. You probably have a basic understanding of the key players in a Vaadin application: components, layouts, listeners, binders, resources, themes, and widget sets; and you, of course, have had your share of Java coding!

Having a solid base when starting a project, not only with Vaadin but with any other technology, plays an important role in successful projects. Understanding what your code does and why it is required helps you make better decisions and become more productive. This chapter will help you understand what is really needed to run a Vaadin application and how you can become more confident about the dependencies and Maven configuration required to start a new Vaadin project.

This chapter covers the following topics:

• The main Java dependencies in Vaadin
• Servlets and UIs
• Maven plugins
• Key elements in a Vaadin application