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- Herausgeber: Packt Publishing
- Kategorie: Wissenschaft und neue Technologien
- Sprache: Englisch
- Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2009
In Detail
In today's world, JSF is one of the pivotal technologies for implementing middle- to large-scale web applications. With Trinidad, JSF developers have a powerful open source component framework at their fingertips.
This book introduces Apache MyFaces Trinidad, a powerful JSF component framework and combines it with Seam, the next-generation Web Application Framework to achieve the most comprehensive and effective technology for the development of powerful rich-client web applications.
In this book, you start out by learning where Trinidad comes from and what its aims are. You will learn how Facelets and Seam are used to get the most out of JSF. In addition, you will also learn the often occurring tag attributes, and, in particular, Trinidad's AJAX technology. You will implement login, authorization, navigation, internationalization, polling, and support for browser issues with the help of these technologies. You will then use Seam-gen for deployment.
Next, you will develop a web application example where a series of selected Trinidad components are applied and their capabilities explored. Finally, you will master the Trinidad dialog framework, a key Trinidad technology that allows the application of dialogs.
A step-by-step, practical guide to creating and developing web applications with Trinidad and Seam
Approach
The book is a hands-on practical guide that stresses the discussion of code and builds up a sample application that illustrates all the standard UI types covered by Trinidad.
Who this book is for
This book is written for Java developers who are beginners at JSF and experienced web developers who are looking for an introduction into the world of open source JSF technology.
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Table of Contents
Apache MyFaces Trinidad 1.2
A Practical Guide
David Thomas
Apache MyFaces Trinidad 1.2
A Practical Guide
Copyright © 2009 Packt Publishing
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embedded in critical articles or reviews.
Every effort has been made in the preparation of this book to ensure the accuracy of the information presented. However, the information contained in this book is sold without warranty, either express or implied. Neither the author, nor Packt Publishing, and its dealers and distributors will be held liable for any damages caused or alleged to be caused directly or indirectly by this book.
Packt Publishing has endeavored to provide trademark information about all of the companies and products mentioned in this book by the appropriate use of capitals. However, Packt Publishing cannot guarantee the accuracy of this information.
First published: November 2009
Production Reference: 1031109
Published by Packt Publishing Ltd. 32 Lincoln Road Olton Birmingham, B27 6PA, UK.
ISBN 978-1-847196-08-8
www.packtpub.com
Cover Image by Vinayak Chittar ( <[email protected]> )
Credits
Author
David Thomas
Reviewers
Cagatay Civici
Simon Lessard
Acquisition Editor
Rashmi Phadnis
Development Editors
Rakesh Shejwal
Siddharth Mangarole
Technical Editor
Mehul Shetty
Indexer
Monica Ajmera
Editorial Team Leader
Akshara Aware
Project Team Leader
Lata Basantani
Project Coordinator
Rajashree Hamine
Proofreader
Jeff Orloff
Graphics
Nilesh Mohile
Production Coordinator
Shantanu Zagade
Cover Work
Shantanu Zagade
About the Author
David Thomas is a developer and technical project manager of Java-based web applications, and has well over 10 years of experience in various web technologies.
He began writing applications based on the Common Gateway Interface (CGI), HTML and Javascript, with a short Java Applets interlude.
The main occupation with Java began when Java took charge of the server. A series of Java Servlet applications were developed using an early, self-built Model-2 controller architecture.
Java Server Pages (JSP) took hold for a rather long time and a couple of major, increasingly complex, web applications were developed in combination with Struts. This also included the development of major portal applications in the finance and banking sector.
Shortly after Java Server Faces 1.2 (JSF) emerged, began the development of a major JSF web application including the development of a high-level framework based on Apache My Faces Trinidad, Facelets and JBOSS Seam in the area of controlling. This project spawned a couple of sub projects, so development continues up to the present day.
This is the author's first book which is highly influenced by the accumulated years of his experience in web technology.
Apart from his work and the writing of this book, David Thomas likes to write music, sing his own songs, and accompany them on piano and guitar. Other hobbies of his are going on holidays, reading books, walking, swimming, making tea, and taking trains.
Furthermore, he is a firm believer in vegetarianism and the responsibility of each human being for her or his well-being and surroundings—in short, of acting locally while thinking globally.
Regarding this book he hopes it will be of great value to many people to enjoy an effective and efficient use of Trinidad.
I would like to thank my wife for her patience during the writing of this book.
About the Reviewers
Cagatay Civici is the PMC member of open source JSF implementation Apache MyFaces and the project lead of popular PrimeFaces framework. In addition to being a recognized speaker in international conferences such as JSFSummit, JSFDays, and local events, he's an author and technical reviewer of books regarding web application development with Java and JSF. Cagatay is currently working as a consultant and instructor in the UK.
Simon Lessard has been using Java since 2000 with a focus first on game server development, and since 2005 on Web development, when he joined Fujitsu Canada team. Since then, he joined the Apache community working mainly on Apache Trinidad and Apache MyFaces 2.0, and also represents Fujitsu Limited on the JSF 2.0 Expert Group.
Preface
In this book, you will learn how Facelets and Seam are used to get the most out of JSF. You start out by learning where Trinidad comes from and what its aims are. Additionally, you will also learn the often occurring tag attributes and, in particular, Trinidad's Ajax technology. You will implement login, authorization, navigation, internationalization, polling and browser issues with the help of these technologies. You will then use Seam-gen for deployment.
As you move through the book, you will develop a web application example where a series of selected Trinidad components are applied and their capabilities explored.
Finally, you will master the Trinidad dialog framework, a Trinidad key technology that allows the application of dialogs.
What this book covers
Chapter 1,Introducing Trinidad, introduces you to the Trinidad component library. We give a general idea of this component library, the areas covered by its components, and compare it to other libraries. Finally, the integration of Trinidad and Seam is discussed.
Chapter 2,Structuring and Building Pages with Facelets , explains Facelets as a basic means to structure and build pages using Facelet page composition, Facelet composition components, and JSTL.
Chapter 3,Most Wanted Tags and Tag Attributes , discusses the Trinidad tags and their attributes in a structured approach. You will gain an insight into the design of Trinidad allowing you to draw an efficient mental map of the library and make an effective selection and application of tags.
Chapter 4,Rendering Pages Partially , introduces you to the Trinidad's Ajax technology called PPR (Partial Page Rendering). PPR is inspected from two points of view the pure tag-based partial rendering and the pure Java-side partial rendering techniques.
Chapter 5,Web Application Groundwork , teaches you how to develop the basic parts of the web application that serves as our Trinidad example. We present using Seam-gen to rapidly deploy after each change of any file.
Chapter 6,Building a Panel-based Content , deals with Trinidad's panelAccordion and showDetailItem components to show how they can be combined to build panel-based, panel-wise collapsible content.
Chapter 7,Building a Form , discusses the combinination of Trinidad's tags to Facelet composition components to build highly flexible and well-formatted forms, including messaging support.
Chapter 8,Growing a Tree , deals with Trinidad's tree components and models and exemplify their application. We present an effective shortcut that makes Trinidad's tree support an easy, and yet powerful, technology.
Chapter 9,The table and treeTable Components , gives an insight to Trinidad's table and treeTable components and exemplifies their application. We apply the components in an increasingly refined way, revealing most of their features one at a time.
Chapter 10,The Chart Component, deals with Trinidad's chart component and shows its application. You will learn to competently set up representation parameters, effectively achieving the intended representation focus and thus graphically materializing hidden information in an appropriate way.
Chapter 11,Building a Wizard, deals with Trinidad's components to implement a wizard and show their application. We present a solution to avoid an existing Facelet problem.
Chapter 12,Dialog—Pop Up Your Web Application, discusses Trinidad's pop-up window techniques. We revisit Seam conversations to address the specific necessities for pop-up dialogs in Trinidad and Seam. We enhance the web application with a couple of pop-up windows including wizard pop-up support.
Appendix, References, provides us with useful references and links related to Apache MyFaces Trinidad.
Conventions
In this book, you will find a number of styles of text that distinguish between different kinds of information. Here are some examples of these styles, and an explanation of their meaning.
Code words in text are shown as follows: "Add a general message area using tr:messages, Trinidad's standard component for this task."
A block of code will be set as follows:
When we wish to draw your attention to a particular part of a code block, the relevant lines or items will be shown in bold:
Any command-line input or output is written as follows:
New terms and important words are shown in bold. Words that you see on the screen, in menus or dialog boxes for example, appear in our text like this: "the check method has returned what it could find under the keyword Green, that is, Green Tea".
Note
Warnings or important notes appear in a box like this.
Note
Tips and tricks appear like this.
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Now that you are the proud owner of a Packt book, we have a number of things to help you to get the most from your purchase.
Note
Downloading the example code for the book
Visithttp://www.packtpub.com/files/code/6088_Code.zip to directly download the example code.
The downloadable files contain instructions on how to use them.
Errata
Although we have taken every care to ensure the accuracy of our content, mistakes do happen. If you find a mistake in one of our books—maybe a mistake in text or code—we would be grateful if you would report this to us. By doing so, you can save other readers from frustration, and help us to improve subsequent versions of this book. If you find any errata, please report them by visiting http://www.packtpub.com/support, selecting your book, clicking on the let us know link, and entering the details of your errata. Once your errata are verified, your submission will be accepted and the errata added to any list of existing errata. Any existing errata can be viewed by selecting your title from http://www.packtpub.com/support.
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Questions
You can contact us at <[email protected]> if you are having a problem with any aspect of the book, and we will do our best to address it.
Chapter 1. Introducing Trinidad
This chapter introduces the user to Apache MyFaces Trinidad—or, in short, Trinidad. Trinidad is a skinnable, Ajax-enabled, JavaServer Faces (JSF) component library that is highly adaptable to various requirements of today's modern web applications. It is most comprehensive in its functionality and consistent in its API interface and design. Trinidad's large component set arguably satisfies many, if not most, of the requirements that even large web applications nowadays have. Its Ajax framework makes sure pages are rendered in an efficient way. Their look and feel is easily switchable thanks to the underlying skin framework. Trinidad's consistent API interface and design makes JSF development become an effective experience.
This chapter will give a general idea of Trinidad. We will cover the following topics:
Background
Trinidad dates back to code development from the beginning of the 21st century. Oracle aimed at the development of a component-based web framework named UIX which would evolve into a core component library for JSF applications and further JSF frameworks themselves. Oracle's early decision to invest in JSF at a time when its future was not at all clear has turned out to be a gamble that paid off. Nowadays, JSF is one of the pivotal technologies when it comes to implementing middle-to-large-scale web applications.
Oracle's next decision, based on its commitment to the open source Java community, was to donate this framework, originally known as Oracle ADF Faces, to the Apache Software Foundation—which happened in 2006. A part of the development team remains at Oracle, thus ensuring design consistency. The Apache and Oracle team then concentrated on clearing the source from source dependencies to ensure the framework source only consisted of open source code. As an aside, Oracle ADF Faces development still continues, but it is now based on Trinidad.
On May 5, 2007, Trinidad left Apache's incubator and joined MyFaces as a subproject. Apache MyFaces is a project of the Apache Software Foundation that is responsible for the open source JSF implementation of the same name that includes a number of sub projects such as Trinidad.
By the end of June, Trinidad saw its first release 1.0.1 supporting JSF 1.1. On July 5, Trinidad 1.2.1, the version for JSF 1.2, was released. By the end of 2007 Trinidad started to become a component library with a frequent release cycle, about every two months on average. For more details, refer to the detailed release table in the Appendix,References. The Apache MyFaces mailing list with around 10 to 20 daily entries on Trinidad is another indication of an active user and developer community.
Milestone
Version
New Features
2006
Trinidad Incubator
Initial version with closed source bounds
05/05/2007
Release as a MyFaces subproject 1.0.1
JSF 1.1 open source component library
07/05/2007
1.2.1 release (in parallel)
JSF 1.2 open source component library
09/06/2007
1.2.2/1.0.2 release
Addition of aclient-side number converter and skinning performance improvement
10/28/2007
1.2.3/1.0.3 release
Panel improvements, DOM method refinement, configuration improvement, icons and skinning improvements, Ajax improvements
12/10/2007
1.2.4/1.0.4 release
EL improvement, skinning/CSS improvement, internationalization improvements
01/14/2008
1.2.5/1.0.5 release
Sorting improvement, EL improvement, further conversion support
02/11/2008
1.2.6/1.0.6 release
Improvements for skinning and rendering, application scope support,
03/16/2008
1.2.7/1.0.7 release
Skinning improvement
05/21/2008
1.2.8/1.0.8 release
Skinning improvement, file upload improvement, pop-up dialog improvement, browser support, tree table improvement
08/07/2008
1.2.9/1.0.9 release
Change Management improvements, panel improvement, demo and documentation updates, converter and input field improvements , browser support
Overview of Trinidad
Trinidad is not just a JSF component library. It provides the developer with a modern web framework that focuses on comprehensiveness and a closed-world software design philosophy. This has two general advantages:
Characteristics of Trinidad
Concretely speaking, the following Trinidad features illustrate this approach's focus on comprehensiveness and closed-world software design:
So now that we have an idea of Trinidad's character, the next obvious question is whether or not it would fit into one of the other JSF project. After all, many component libraries are available, then why should we make Trinidad our next project? It is not easy to make a choice if both variation and complexity are high.
Note
If a component is missing, it is usually a better approach to rely on the addition of a JavaScript library, a self-written Facelet or JSF component than trying to integrate another component library that has such a component.
General key criteria for the choosing of Trinidad
No library can be the perfect choice for everyone, as software development projects are simply too different in their requirements. However, if we take a look at general criteria for the choice of a component library where Trinidad is strikingly strong, it will provide a clear and more detailed picture of Trinidad's strengths and help in making your choice.
So, in this section we will just give an idea which are the key criterias to the choice of Trinidad and why Trinidad is, if judged from these criteria, a very commendable choice. Further criteria for the choice of a JSF component library can be found in http://www.jsfmatrix.net.
Following are the criteria:
Tip
A warning to everybody to avoid IE because of security leaks and the many bugs!
We have seen that Trinidad's framework character helps in various aspects when developing a JSF application. However, there are a couple of issues where Trinidad relies on JSF, and JSF itself is not refined enough to cope with them in an easy way.
Seamidad! Ease JSF development with Seam
To be able to better concentrate on the Trinidad component library without having to deal with JSF intricacies and shortcomings, the Seam web framework was introduced. The areas are discussed where Seam comes very favorably into play, that is, scopes such as conversation context, navigation and authorization. Moreover, integration issues are also mentioned. Further details are discussed in the web application chapters.
Introduction and overview of Seam
Trinidad focuses on the viewer side of development, providing concrete JSF components. Seam is a next-generation web framework that has its focus much more on the internal middle tier layer whose domain and controller objects can be managed by Seam to live as Seam objects. This makes it much easier to manage them inside the context of a web application. So the middle-tier covered by Seam involves the management and support for the following types of objects:
Therefore, Seam's emphasis is on providing an overall glue framework for all tiers, with a notable emphasis on the middle-tier. At the same time, this is the main reason why it comes into consideration to fill all the gaps and incongruities left by other frameworks including JSF and Trinidad.
The following image shows the application tiers and the framework responsibilities:
Therefore, to allow one to enjoy the advantages of both frameworks, the approach of combining both frameworks is well worth considering. Thus, for the middle-tier layer, where Trinidad rather leaves us to the mercies of JSF, we could take advantage of Seam. Note that, in the past, such a combination also meant some tedious integration work.
In the mean time, integration has been resolved up to a point where, arguably, no serious issues remain. Note that we will still find some integration issues, but we will also resolve them over the course of our Trinidad development sample.
