New Drafts of Java EE Web Tier: JSF 1.2, JSP 2.1, Servlet 2.5

I'm pleased to announce another revision of the Java EE Web Tier. In
Jan Luehe's blog
you can find out what's new in JSP 2.1 Proposed Final Draft 2 (PFD2).
The href="http://jcp.org/aboutJava/communityprocess/maintenance/jsr154/servlet-2.5_MR2.html">Change
Log for Servlet 2.5 will give you the scoop on the Servlet spec.
This blog entry will show what's new in the JSF spec.

In JSF, the most visible new feature since the last draft of the spec
is the addition of the invokeOnComponent() method on
UIComponent. See below for more details.

This revision of the Java Web Tier is fully implemented in href="https://glassfish.dev.java.net/downloads/15Feb06.html">glassfish
build 37, Sun's open source Java EE 5 Application Server, and the
basis for the upcoming href="http://java.sun.com/javaee/">Java EE SDK.

Spec changes since PFD, chronologically by section number

• 9.5: The href="http://java.sun.com/j2ee/javaserverfaces/1.2/docs/tlddocs/index.html">TLDDocs
  for the h: and f: taglibs are now a normative part of the
  spec.

• 5.4: Use of href="http://jcp.org/en/jsr/detail?id=250">JSR-250 Common
  Annotations @PostConstruct and
  @PreDestroy for managed bean lifecycle
  notifications. See href="http://weblogs.java.net/blog/edburns/archive/2005/08/using_ejb_annot.html">my
  August 2005 blog entry for more on this feature.

• 3.1.10: Specify how EL ValueExpressions
  must me handled in the attributes map returned from
  UIComponent.getAttributes().

• 5.4: List the supported Java EE 5 annotations one may
  put in a JSF Managed bean.

  @Resource
  @Resources
  @EJB
  @EJBs
  @WebServiceRef
  @WebServiceRefs
  @PersistenceContext
  @PersistenceContexts
  @PersistenceUnit
  @PersistenceUnits

• 2.2.2: Define the term "local value" more concretely.

• Preface: Added section on backwards compatibility with
  previous versions of the JSF spec.

• 9.4.8: Explicitly state that the use and meaning of a
  UIParameter child is the responsibility of the
  parent component inside which it is nested.

• 5.3: State that managed bean properties may be Java
  enum types. Define coercion rules.

• 7.1.1: Widen the expected type returned from a
  UICommand action method to be Object
  instead of String. This allows the use of Java
  enum types as returns from action methods, which can simplify
  navigation rules.

• 7.3: State that the Action method must return
  Object.

• 3.1.8: New method:
  UIComponent.invokeOnComponent(), and supporting
  callback interface ContextCallback. This method
  allows you to execute a callback on an arbitrary node in the
  view given its clientId. An override is provided
  for UIData that provides for correctly
  positioning the table to the proper row before continuing to
  find the component.

• 9.3.1.2: Add a note mentioning that
  tld-version in an explicit taglib def, and
  version in an implicit taglib def are
  semantically equivalent with respect to their use in
  determining the backwards compatability strategy employed.

JSF-API Contract Changes, chronological by functional area

• Standard HTML RenderKit: Changes to outputText,
  outputFormat, message and messages renderers. Add header and
  footer facets to the declaration of UIColumn.
  Specify that the default value of the "rendered" property is
  true. The "target" attribute of the link
  renderers is not a passthru attribute. Modify commandLink
  renderer to describe what should happen if "disabled" is true.
  Attributes that have a boolean value or meaning, such as
  "ismap", "disabled", or "readonly", must be rendered without
  attribute minization. For example, "ismap=ismap". Update
  "acceptcharset" attribute on Form to be non-passthrough since
  the attribute value is rendered as "accept-charset".
  GridRenderer supports the "caption" attribute.

• Wrappers for decorating

  <a
  	  href="http://java.sun.com/j2ee/javaserverfaces/1.2/docs/api/javax/faces/application/StateManagerWrapper.html">StateManager</a>

  ,
  

  <a
  	  href="http://java.sun.com/j2ee/javaserverfaces/1.2/docs/api/javax/faces/application/ViewHandlerWrapper.html">ViewHandler</a>

  ,
  and

  <a
  	  href="http://java.sun.com/j2ee/javaserverfaces/1.2/docs/api/javax/faces/application/ResponseWriterWrapper.html">ResponseWriter</a>

  .

• JSP Custom tags for JSF 1.2 Components must now extend
  

  <a
  	  href="http://java.sun.com/j2ee/javaserverfaces/1.2/docs/api/javax/faces/webapp/UIComponentELTag.html">javax.faces.webapp.UIComponentELTag</a>

  .
  JSF 1.1 component tags still extend

  <a
  	  href="http://java.sun.com/j2ee/javaserverfaces/1.2/docs/api/javax/faces/webapp/UIComponentTag.html">UIComponentTag</a>

  ,
  which is now deprecated.

• The

  <a
  	  href="http://java.sun.com/j2ee/javaserverfaces/1.2/docs/api/javax/faces/component/UIForm.html#isPrependId()">prependId</a>

  
  property of UIForm is now
  ValueExpression enabled.

• New method on UIComponent,

  <a
  	  href="http://java.sun.com/j2ee/javaserverfaces/1.2/docs/api/javax/faces/component/UIComponent.html#invokeOnComponent(javax.faces.context.FacesContext,java.lang.String,javax.faces.component.ContextCallback)">invokeOnComponent</a>

  
  and new callback interface

  <a
  	  href="http://java.sun.com/j2ee/javaserverfaces/1.2/docs/api/javax/faces/component/ContextCallback.html">ContextCallback</a>

  .

• Relax the spec language for

  <a
  	  href="http://java.sun.com/j2ee/javaserverfaces/1.2/docs/api/javax/faces/component/UIComponent.html#findComponent(java.lang.String)">findComponent</a>

  
  to allow for any implementation that accomplishes the same
  thing as the specified algorithm. Also allow for
  findComponent to work properly if nested naming
  containers with the same name exist.

JSF-API Implementation Changes, chronological by functional area

• Refactored build system to be more maintainable.

• Rob Gibson contributed a fix to improve how more than
  one JSF portlet may run in the same portal.

• Performance improvements in attribute/property
  transparency.

• Modify FacesServlet so that if the servlet
  is prefix mapped, requests starting with WEB-INF
  or META-INF must return
  SC_NOT_FOUND.

• Changes to make tree creation and content interweaving
  work with jsp:include and JSTL's
  c:import.

• Changed all @exception javadoc statements
  to @throws statements due to Sun bug 6359046.

• Allow UIParameter children inside of
  select* components.

• Various backwards compatibility allowances.

Technorati Tags: edburns