Integrating Struts 2 + JSF + Facelets
What if you didn't have to choose between a request-based framework and a component-based framework? What if you could use them together and use request-based for some pages and component-based for others? This is the functionality that the Struts 2 JSF Plugin provides.
To be fair, the JSF-Spring project says it does the same thing for Spring MVC + JSF, but there doesn't appear to be any documentation.
I did some prototyping of Struts 2 + JSF and discovered that it does indeed work. I also discovered that there's no documentation on integrating it with Facelets. Luckily, it's pretty easy to do - hence my reason for writing this entry. You might ask why I want to use Facelets when JSF 1.2 supports JSP fairly well? My reason is because JSP 2.1 hijacks #{}, which Struts 2's OGNL uses for some expressions. Because of this, I want to be able to run on a JSP 2.0 container until a workaround comes along. Sun's JSF 1.2 RI can run on a JSP 2.0 container, while MyFaces 2.1 cannot (at least in my experience).
There's two ways to get Struts 2 + JSF + Facelets working:
- Create a WEB-INF/faces-config.xml file and override the default view-handler:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?> <faces-config xmlns="http://java.sun.com/xml/ns/javaee" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance" xsi:schemaLocation="http://java.sun.com/xml/ns/javaee http://java.sun.com/xml/ns/javaee/web-facesconfig_1_2.xsd" version="1.2"> <application> <view-handler>com.sun.facelets.FaceletViewHandler</view-handler> </application> </faces-config> - The 2nd way is to use Ajax4JSF and declare the view-handler in your web.xml (allowing you to get rid of faces-config.xml):
<context-param> <param-name>org.ajax4jsf.VIEW_HANDLERS</param-name> <param-value>com.sun.facelets.FaceletViewHandler</param-value> </context-param>
NOTE: You have to use 2nd method if you want to use Ajax4JSF. It won't read the view-handler from faces-config.xml.
If you're using SiteMesh, you may have to add another <parser> element to your sitemesh.xml to get Facelets pages decorated:
<parser content-type="application/xhtml+xml"
class="com.opensymphony.module.sitemesh.parser.HTMLPageParser"/>
Thanks to Laurie Harper for his assistance figuring this stuff out.
Now you might ask - why would you want to do this? For one, Struts 2 has a better navigation model (IMO) than JSF. Also, if developers want to use JSF and think it's a better way for a certain module - let them go to it!
Posted by Sergey Smirnov on July 26, 2007 at 07:03 PM MDT #
Posted by Matt Raible on July 26, 2007 at 07:47 PM MDT #
Posted by Dale Newfield on July 27, 2007 at 09:04 AM MDT #
Posted by musachy on July 27, 2007 at 07:14 PM MDT #
Posted by Matt Raible on July 27, 2007 at 07:16 PM MDT #
Posted by Lupus on July 30, 2007 at 07:31 PM MDT #
Lupus - it should be a matter of registering FacesServlet in your web.xml and configuring the Struts 2 JSF Plugin appropriately. Have you looked at the showcase example? That's how I figured it out.
I'll make sure and add a Struts 2 + JSF installer for AppFuse Light 1.8. I expect to release AL 1.8 and AppFuse 2.0 this month (crosses fingers).
Posted by Matt Raible on August 02, 2007 at 08:39 PM MDT #
My requirement is to use JSF compenents with my existing Struts apps. and navigation should go though "Struts config", and not though "faces-config".
Email id to send sample apps: [email protected]
Posted by Dharani on August 25, 2008 at 02:23 PM MDT #
Posted by Matt Raible on August 25, 2008 at 07:22 PM MDT #
Posted by Parash Goswami on September 22, 2009 at 06:01 AM MDT #
Matt, I have an existing Struts 1 application that I've successfully merged with Struts2 since they're in difference namespaces this worked great until I'm able to move struts 1 actions to struts 2.
I've also taken the time to implement Spring into my Struts 2 implementation which also works splendid.
So far so good.
Now, I want Ajax! Not Dojo or JQuery either. I want a complete Ajax component implementation as the foundation for some serious custom work I'm about to implement.
My question, have you ever been able to get RichFaces(or MyFaces) to seamlessly integrate with Struts 2? If not can you point me in the right direction as I'm literally going crazy trying to find ANY example of how this is done. I think I'm close but I'm getting errors related to th OGNL that I can't seem to get around.
Thank you for taking time to respond. I would sincerely appreciate ANY feedback that you can provide.
-john:m
Posted by John on November 15, 2010 at 04:43 AM MST #
Posted by Sindhu.A on June 22, 2011 at 09:14 PM MDT #
Posted by rp on June 30, 2011 at 04:28 PM MDT #
Posted by Matt Raible on June 30, 2011 at 05:38 PM MDT #
Posted by AS on August 10, 2011 at 02:14 PM MDT #
I have had success using Struts2, JSF + Facelets and Richfaces together. I can provide the configuration needed, but it is too much to post here.
I do have one problem. It appears that there is no way (at least I have not found it) to configure struts2 + JSF/Facelets and still be able to use struts tags. I can use them if I don't configure Facelets, but the Facelets filter does not allow a taglib entry when it parses the .xhtml file.
I can add an xml namespace for struts-tags, and this allows me to get the tag autocomplete in eclipse, but the s:XXX tags are not rendered.
This means that the only real benefit of using Struts2 and facelets together is in the URL mapping provided by struts. Is there anyway to overcome this, or is it all or nothing when adding adding facelets?
Posted by Jesse Demarco on October 07, 2011 at 08:10 PM MDT #
Posted by Kein on September 03, 2012 at 03:42 PM MDT #
Matt, I have an existing Struts 1 application that I've successfully merged with Struts2 this worked great.
Now I integrated JSF & Richfaces to my Struts2 implementation, I just need view pages with Rich tags its working fine. I had empty faces-config.xml for this. But I need to know how to call Struts Action by using <h:commandbutton />(Jsf tag in .xhtml).
As I know
1.In JSF, actions are called as "#{beanName.methodName}"
2.In Struts 2, actions are called as "methodNameActioName"
*** Please help me to call Struts Action by using Jsf tags(ex:<h:commandbutton />).
Thank you for taking time to respond. I would sincerely appreciate ANY feedback that you can provide.
Posted by Tito on September 11, 2014 at 02:50 PM MDT #