JSF

Building a custom JSF component is often the right thing to do.

With all the background work out of the way, I think you're ready to take the plunge and develop your own custom JSF components.

Even then, it was readily apparent that JSF made adopting Ajax more difficult than it had to be.

This would make it easier for a developer to use individual parts of JSF without being forced to use all of it.

One of the down sides to using JSF was the technology used for the rendering layer, which by default was provided by JavaServer Pages (JSP).

WebSphere Studio enables you to easily drag the Web service onto a portlet page in the form of a JSF Web service client component.

JSF, to put it in terms we Domino developers understand, is the equivalent of a custom-class rendering engine.

But before we get into all that, I'll take just a minute to separate some JSF FUD from fact.

Many JSF components require additional resources to be added to the page or to the application.

For pages wanting to use both input and output controls on the same page, it is quite easy to develop a JSF page with no navigation.

We told you to refer back to the JSF application lifecycle and see if you could figure it out.

Once you ve laid out the page in normal HTML you want to tell the JSF system that you re going to be using JSF to manage your components.

We've covered quite a bit of ground in this article when it comes to JSF conversion and validation.

The last field in this section specifies the names of any JSF facets that may be used with a component.

JSF is the result of lessons learned over several years of evolving Web development techniques on the Java platform.

That said, the truth is that JSF is not bound to JSP technology inherently.

As with all things JSF, I promise it will be easier than you think and far too rewarding, in terms of time and headache saved, to ignore.

You can associate expressions to any property on a component, thus allowing the component's property value to be set with JSF-EL.

I've barely scratched the surface of JSF 2 features so far, with managed bean annotations, simplified navigation, and support for resources.

For the type-ahead JSF component to work, its value attribute must be bound to a Map object.

The location bar does not get updated to reflect the new view after an action because JSF advances to it through a server-side redirect.

The easiest way to dissolve your preconceptions about JSF is to delve right into the technology, and we'll do that in just a few minutes.

Seam components are more like Spring beans than JSF managed beans in that they plug into a sophisticated, aspect-oriented framework.

The JSP tags in a JSF application render the view and represent the component, but cannot change the state of a JSF component.

Each entry and element of such a data map contains the value of a JSF input component whose ID is also the key in the data map.

The technique presented here can be used to set any attributes or properties of the JSF components, not just the default styles.

While JSF makes it easier for you to create richer HTML-based user interfaces, JSF is by design a server-based technology.

Throughout this series I've tried to help you overcome the FUD that has caused many Java developers to shy away from using JSF technology.

Looking back at Figure 1, JSF is at the heart of the Controller layer in this application.

Now you will create a JSF Web project to see how the new component library integrates with the JSF tools.

I'll get you started this month with an architectural overview of JSF and a working example demonstrating the fundamentals of MVC and JSF.

Let's consider some of these enhancements as they apply to the common challenges of JSF development.

You'll be able to mix your non-JSF components with the JSF components in the same Web page and you'll avoid much of the JSF complexity.

Combining JSF with JavaScript to deal with just one component, rather than the entire page, is called immediate event handling.

Some other writers seem to suggest that integrating Acegi with JSF requires the JSF application to serve the login page (see Resources).

JSF is beginning to dominate the Java Web application market because of its status as a Java Web standard.

Facelets seems to really scratch an itch for the JSF development community.

JSF 1. x has no facility for handling these so component developers typically have to develop their own mechanism.

It's great to be able to use all different JSF component libraries available today, isn't it?

You examined the navigation of the Web application, as mapped out in the JSF configuration file, faces-config. xml.

In particular, the JSF API has become a central piece in the evolving Web, at least as far as the Java platform is concerned.

There it features a set of Rich Client JSF Components which are part of its Application Development Framework (ADF).

Tag, which informs the container that you re using JSF to manage the components contained inside of it.

The JSF EL supplies the implicit get in interpreting the method name to call for the binding.

JSF makes it easy to designate Java code that is invoked when forms are submitted. The code can respond to particular buttons, changes.

It is also the only current AAM capable of conducting lock-on before-launch engagements from inside the JSF's internal weapons bay.

Now we are ready to create the output section of the JSF Page.

All faces requests are intercepted by the Faces Servlet, which is configured in the web. xml descriptor of any JSF-based Web application.

I'll then demonstrate a couple of new techniques that are especially suitable for securing JavaBeans used in JSF applications.

Hands down, this deficiency is one of the primary sources of confusion for developers learning to use JSF.

Dropdowns are commonly used in the presentation, whether it is portlet or just a JSF Web page.

And throughout it all, the JSF application lifecycle provides a reliable infrastructure for consistently ensuring data-model integrity.

You can download the JSF specification, the reference implementation, two sample applications, and a JSF tutorial from Resources.

When it comes to driving dynamic data to the JSF components, you could use a number of different solutions.

Shale Test also has integration with Spring Framework to allow a JSF component to be bound as a managed bean or as a Spring bean.

We are now ready to add the Web service to the JSP using the page data panel and JSF controls.

The next step in the evolution of this model is wrapping one toolkit (like Dojo) with another like (JSF).

Once you re familiar with the JSF way of doing things, I think you ll find it hard to go back to Struts Model 2-style development.

Also, the spec gives you a way to determine if the application is using JSF, and then you have to do things of that nature.

Next, add the seam: component tag inside of the definition of any Spring bean you would like to expose to JSF.

As is usual in a JSF application, navigation is mapped out in the faces-config. xml file.

While JSF specification makes it possible to create new components, it does not make it particularly simple.

The JSF is a sophisticated combat jet that will be tailored to meet the unique requirements of the Air Force, Navy and Marines.

Uses of this servlet filter include integration with non-JSF requests, propagating conversations over redirects, and managing file uploads.

This application demonstrates how stateful behavior can be introduced to JSF managed beans through the use of the conversation scope.

Spring comes with a variable resolver implementation class that lets you reference Spring managed beans in JSF expressions.

The JSF specification actually does some of the data selection legwork for you.

Therefore, JSF's expression resolving-mechanism must be able to resolve Acegi's IOC beans.

At this time, JSF has no good solution to this problem.

The JSF framework controller uses the view ID to look up the components for the current view.

the reference implementation, two sample applications, and a JSF tutorial from Resources.

In the case of a new view, JSF builds the view of the Faces page and wires the event handlers and validators to the components.

Eventually, solutions began to roll out that suggested using JSF PhaseListeners or component Renderers to handle partial page updates.

Using the JSF framework together with a good component library may be the right choice if you are building a sophisticated Web application.

The following table shows converter ids and the corresponding implementation classes used by JSF for a simple data conversion.

The spring-web package, part of the Spring distribution, ships with a custom JSF variable resolver to establish this bridge.

A handler class, effectively a JSF backing bean, which constructs the actual graphical view out of JSF components.

JSF's fine-tuned event model allows your applications to be less tied to HTTP details and simplifies your development effort.

Once that setup is complete, you can shift your native JSF application to Seam one managed bean at a time.

As previously mentioned, the JSF framework is designed to be remarkably easy on the application developer.

The tutorial winds down with a taste of some advanced JSF programming: create an object-level validation framework using a phase listener.

Remember that the endgame of a Facelets template is to create a JSF component tree.

The following portion of XHTML file shows how the custom JSF compoenent was used to generate the DOJO's tree and tabbed pane widgets.

The JSF specification completely disregards exception management, placing its responsibility entirely on the servlet container.

This ensures that the appropriate portlet tag libraries are initialized and used in the JSF presentation.

In Part 1 of this article series, we presented an accelerated JSF development solution for a XML-based SOA application.

In Part 2 of this article series, we described an accelerated JSF development solution for a XML-based SOA application.

Notice that the pattern is defining other JSF tags to make up a new column, and its header section inside the dataTable.

The var attribute declares a variable that will be used to iterate over the list, a pattern often used by JSF components.

This is much simpler that specifying navigation rules in a configuration file as in the case of the JSF framework.

In JSF, an UI event handler method can determine which page to display next by returning the string name of a navigation rule.

JPA entities are a natural fit to be used as the data-binding model required for most JSF components.

Because the JSF life cycle remains the central piece of a Seam application, there is no retraining period to endure.

Keep reading this series and decide for yourself if JSF is a viable alternative to Struts for your project.

Custom JSF components were used to generate the necessary HTML for the Tree and Split Container components of DOJO.

Remember that JSF is a UI framework that provides GUI components and an event model for developing dynamic data driven Web user interfaces.

Back in the test page (testPage. jsp), notice that the t: commandButton tag was automatically surrounded by a JSF form tag.

Additionally, JSF component bindings used by the backing bean will not be available either.

With a few simple annotations, the EJB3 business components in Seam can now be used directly to back JSF web forms or handle web UI events.

You should be able to implement the same features from Acegi in a JSF application without writing any Java code.

Once properly mapped, the catalog bean simply acts as a wrapper for the JSF catalog application's public and private data.

JSF checks the configuration file shown in Listing 3 to find definition of the catalog bean and instantiates it.

Let's start by looking at a web. xml file that you can deploy to secure your JSF applications.

If you are using JSF and haven't heard of Seam, I highly recommend that you check out the Seam reference documentation (see Resources).

And with that you really do know the essentials of JSF component development.

JSF's javax. faces. el. VariableResolver class is a default expression resolver capable of resolving expressions to JSF's managed beans.

In this case, the JSF implementation cannot restore the component tree, which must be created in the Render Response phase.

For instance, Seam includes a servlet filter that extends the scope of its features beyond the JSF life cycle.

Remember that data maps contain the values of the JSF components, which must be serializable according to the JSF specification.

While the lost events may seem like an exceptional condition, it raises no red flags in the JSF life cycle.

Like Swing and AWT JSF is a development framework that provides a set of standard, reusable GUI components.

Then, the JSF framework traverses the tree recursively, updating the state of the components.

Stay tuned for the next article of the series, where you'll find out how to create JSF-like components, using JSP tag files.

You will see that for the Tomahawk dataTable it has been set to the standard JSF var attribute.

The JSF configuration file can also be used to provide a value for the maxDataMaps property of the data repository.

The validateEmail method is used by JSF to perform custom validation on an inputText component value bound to a user. email model property.

This example clearly demonstrates that the one-to-one mapping between a JSF request URL and view template is not imperative.

A non-standard JSF component producing a larger HTML fragment, such as a tree or a table, may not let you set the style of any HTML element.

JSF is a set of Java classes and JSP tag libraries that provide a framework for developing Web applications.

(or similar) is a message. properties file that contains the default messages shown in Figure 14.

One way is to search the parent component of the dynamic elements in the JSF components tree and then remove or insert elements.

Now the road hazard of multi-thread JSF Web application is no longer in your way.

The faces context wraps information about application resources that the faces servlet will later require to execute the JSF life cycle.

However, the JSF EL code actually associates the fields with the corresponding values of the backing beans properties.

Also, since JSF components are exposed as tag libraries, we've looked at some of the source for the XHTML pages.

Attributes that follow standard JSF naming conventions (like these preceding examples) are all preset to appropriate values.

Spring provides an expression resolver for JSF in a class named org. springframework. web. jsf. DelegatingVariableResolver.

JSF 1 was developed in an ivory tower, and the results, arguably, were less than spectacular.

These later frameworks are classified as action-based, whereas JSF is a member of a new family of frameworks based on a component model.

Therefore, the application needs to control the JSF request processing life cycle, which can be easily done by implementing a PhaseListener.

The JSF form contains three input components: a text field, a checkbox, and a drop-down list.

If you have experience developing applications with JSF, then you know that blindly fetching data in getter methods is strongly discouraged.

The standard set of components that ships with JSF has JSP bindings and generates HTML renderings.

Instead, the event handler for the category list populates the subcategories and forces JSF to skip to the render response phase.

Add the varValidCodesRootBean in the page data to be a JSF managed bean and set the scope as application.

When a JSF validator finds an error, the form is returned to the user so he or she can correct it.

All JSF applications must route the first JSP page displayed by the application through the JSF controller servlet.

In Part 2, you see how to store the data of the current JSF view into a data repository.

Although JSF 2 was indeed specified by a bunch of eggheads, it was also driven by real-world innovation.

We use a custom private helper method to turn the EL expression string into an actual JSF valueBinding instance.

Easier: You no lnger have to tweak your content fragment file to make it run the JSF and Struts Tiles together.

However, while EJB3 and JSF are complementary to each other, they are designed as separate frameworks each with its own philosophy.

The style class name will be provided through the styleClass attribute to the JSF components as shown in Listing 6.

file is a standard configuration file for JSF. Seam uses it to add the Seam interceptor into the JSF lifecycle.

It helps you develop drag-and-drop applications with JavaServerFaces (JSF) and Service Data Objects (SDO), as shown in Figure 3.

You must write at least some Java code to hand over user credentials (username and password) from JSF's login page to Acegi.

The validation rules can be pre-defined (shipped with JSF) or defined by the developer.

It uses the technique you've learned in the previous couple of sections to secure access to data wrapped inside JSF managed beans.

JSF cannot build the component tree, and later cannot look up the component tree that was already created.

The wrapped value is now available to the JSF variable resolver, and thus the view.

Pager controls provided in JSF are used to paginate between these sets of data in the JSF pages being used as portlet views.

So you use standard JSF components and quickly build an address form out of various input and output fields (Figure 1).

This article is the first part of a series titled "Craft Ajax applications using JSF with CSS and JavaScript. "

The JSF life cycle encourages strong component-oriented design by shielding application code from the underlying servlet model.

JSF is a set of APIs that enable a component-based approach to user-interface development.

You should be familiar with the ideas behind JSF to get the most out of this article.

And that's it -- not much more is needed to develop a simple JSF component.

Besides, a little dose of JSF lifecycle know-how can go a long way toward simplifying your Web application development efforts.

Typically, those handlers specify a URL, and the JSF implementation forwards the request to that URL.

Backbase - AJAX JSF Edition runs in all major Java Application Servers. It enables Single Page Interfaces, eliminating full page reloads.

JSP is singularly focused on generating dynamic output , whereas JSF requires JSP to coordinate building a component model .

By combining portal and JSF technologies, you can rapidly construct sophisticated user interfaces for the Web.

In this four-part series, I'll do my best to dispel all three myths in the most practical way possible: by teaching you to work around them.

In the previous section, we walked through the creation of a JSF form.

If the number of tree nodes is large ( more than 200 ) then the custom JSF component must not generate code for more than 200 nodes.

Notice all of the usual and familiar JSF tags used to create this new component.

Composite components are a mainstay of JSF component development and will save you lots of time!

Figure 2 is an object state diagram of the six phases of the JSF lifecycle, including validation and event handling.

Configure the varBrokerUpdateRootBean in the page data to be a JSF managed bean, and set the scope as session (Figure 11).

However, the major contribution of JSF is its component-based model, which promotes reusability and extensibility.

Next, you add the JSF phase listener to the faces-config. xml file, as shown in Listing 2.

The imported projects contain multiple portlets that share JSF JSPs and use property broker for portlet communication.

JSF provides a component model and a richer MVC environment than most Model 2 implementations.

However, each time JSF resolves that expression, it triggers an additional invocation, which could in turn hit the service layer.

We will now create a second JSF form to access stock history, although we will only step through the creation process at a high level.

The fragments correlate to the individual JSF components on the page and manifest themselves as partial page updates.

With the JSF-Spring integration installed, this expression resolves to a bean named courseManager, defined in the Spring bean configuration.

As mentioned earlier, portlet presentation is much more sophisticated than a pure JSF Web application.

You can use JSF components directly within the Facelets templating language without any additional development.

The latter situation occurs because JSF configures forms to post back to the same URL that generated them.

Seam rectifies this and completes JSF's state management picture by establishing an entirely new conversation scope.

Developing a managed bean with Seam is almost shockingly easy compared to the typical JSF configuration process.

Facelets knows about the JSF component tree, and its sole purpose in life is to build that component tree.

That method requires that you identify all JSF components and write them into your JSF pages.

This choice specifies which attribute is modified when you drag data from the Page Data view onto a JSF tag in a page.

Before we get started, take a look at Figure 1, a diagram of the JSF lifecycle.

JSF calls the catalog bean's setter methods to set public and private data in the catalog bean.

Shale seems to come closer, being fundamentally based on JSF, but I have some reservations about it.

In short: The Seam remoting library enables JSF to achieve the interactive design that its creators had envisioned all along.

All JSF HTML tags have a rendered attribute, the boolean value of which decides whether the HTML widget will be shown to the user or not.

For Facelets templates to take effect, you need to tell JSF about the Facelets view handler.

I'll discuss JSF's expression-resolving mechanism of JSF momentarily (in " Defining an expression resolver" ).

For the remainder of the article I'll focus on the step-by-step process of actually creating an application in JSF.

JSF also uses ResourceBundle as a localization Pack, which is backed up by a set of properties files.

You now have a brand new JSF component library that you can use in your Web applications or share with your co-workers.

The simplest way to use secure beans in a JSF application is to follow the same approach used in the five steps in Listing 4 of Part 3.

For instance, one of the major complaints of JSF is that it relies too much on HTTP POST.

Let's take a quick walk through the steps involved in using Seam Remoting to "Ajaxify" your JSF applications.

The use of the active stick and throttle and a cutoff switch was introduced on the JSF demonstrator, the X-35.

Use Spring's DelegatingVariableResolver in JSF's configuration file as in this article's " Defining an expression resolver" section.

I know this because I ve written both a Struts course and a JSF course and I ve taught them both.

JSF to ensure form data is automatically validated to be correct.

Because getter methods are invoked many, many times during a typical execution of the JSF life cycle.

JSF helps to put that data into context when the action is being processed.

A getEmployee data get method was generated and is bound to the JSF form (Listing 5).

Instead, Seam is a very powerful extension to JSF that naturally enhances the JSF life cycle.

All protected pages are developed using JSF components, whereas Acegi serves the login page and performs authentication and authorization.

The implications of Shale's dependency on JSF are significant and, surprisingly, for the most part positive.

Figure 1 shows a partial listing of the Java classes that are controlled by the managed bean facility in JSF.

This feature, based on JSF PhaseListener interface, causes all the configuration files and classes to be reloaded.

The application skeleton also implements JSF, which we didn't explore in this article but is a great point of exploration.

The JSF 2. 0 Expert Group essentially standardized some of the best features from those open source projects.

More typically, the tag tells the JSF framework exactly which JSF components to configure and render in great detail.

If you want to use the custom component in a JSF 1. 1-based application, the superclass of the tag handler must be UIComponentTag.

While preparing, JSF finds the catalog bean in the JSF page shown in Listing 2.

The techniques that we describe next will help you make your multi-thread JSF applications more robust.

Some developers using JSF may never write a component or extend the framework, while others may focus on just those tasks.

The preceding section demonstrated that you can use IOC beans directly in your JSF applications.

This technique lets you can develop your JSF applications without considering security issues.

I also provided an in-depth explanation of events that happen when you deploy your JSF-Acegi application and when a user accesses it.

JSF tags support the JSTL expression language; JSP 2. 0 will fully support the JSTL expression language as well.

JSF does the actual storage and state management, typically though a session, a hidden form field, cookies, etc.

Using the Properties view, you can modify any of the button tag's attributes using the usual JSF tools.

JSF makes creating components easy because all the heavy lifting is done by API and base classes.

We'll wrap up this series next month, with an in-depth look at writing your own custom components in JSF.

All templates for generating JSF code are now available in Preferences and use simplified JSP-like syntax.

JSF is a convenient Web framework to generate HTML pages, receive user input, and manage navigation flow.

For instance, when the user clicks a button to submit a JSF form, Seam automatically parses the form fields and constructs an entity bean.

Figure 3 shows where conversion and validation would occur in the JSF application lifecycle were the immediate attribute set to true.

When the eager attribute is true, JSF creates the managed bean at startup and places it in application scope.

After you made a choice, several JSF tags would be added to the page according to the selection that you made in the wizard.

In the helloworld project, we included two test cases for unit testing and integrated JSF testing in the test folder.

In effect, JSF understands that an action on a row is associated with the row's underlying data.

In JSF, you bind form inputs to properties of your domain model.

Thus, JSF components consist of two parts: the component and the renderer.

This is not the only way or the best way to create a search page, but this way illustrates several important EGL and JSF concepts.

A growing landscape of third-party JSF components exists in both the open source community and the licensed-software realm.

To expose your bean to the JSF life cycle, all you need to do is place a single annotation, @Name, above the class definition.

JavaScript code can be inserted in a JSF page as in any regular Web page, using the element of HTML (see Listing 1).

MyFaces or JSF is a loosely coupled framework concentrating on the UI Layer and the bindings to the middle tier.

Now, let's look at a few things that tie portlet and JSF development together.

Drag the Output component to the JSF page, as shown in Figure 18.

The main technologies used are Ajax, JSF using IBM Enhanced Faces components, and service data objects (SDOs).

If your JSF application is a JSF 2 (or a Facelets), place the tag library declaration in the XHTML page, as shown in Listing 2.

The navigation. xml file contains JSF page navigation rules for multi-page applications.

The IRAD JSF tooling will now generate the form shown in Figure 15.

JSF components, like AWT components, have containers and components.

You might wonder why to do this if the component is already available in the JSF framework.

So far, you've learned how to submit form data to a JSF page with Ajax.

To create our first JSF form, your workspace should first be open from the last exercise from Part 1.