Struts 2

Struts2
Reinventing Struts1 Wheel
Ori Dar
Consultant and Architect,
AlphaCSP
2
Copyright AlphaCSP Israel 2008 – Web Framework Playoff Seminar
Agenda
 Introduction
 Background
 Framework features review
 Configuration
 View technology
 Page flow
 Form binding
 Table sorting
 Pagination
 Validation
 AJAX
 Error handling
 I18n support
 Documentation
 Summary
3
Introduction::In a nutshell (1)
• Action Based MVC Framework

–FilterDispatcher : controller
–Action : POJO model
–Result : view
• Comparable to
–Struts1
–Spring MVC
–Stripes
4
•First released in Oct. 2006

–Merger of Struts1 and WebWork2
–Uses WebWork2 architecture
•Modern and clean architecture
•Xml or annotations
–Actions
–Validators
–Datatype convertors
5
•Extensible via plugins

–Other frameworks integration
–Embedding other application modules
•Intuitive, fast learning curve
•Other core components
–Interceptors: controlling action pre and
post processing
–ValueStack: central storage for request
model data
6
Introduction::HelloWorld
Controller: FilterDispatcher
<filter>
<filter-name>action2</filter-name>
<filter-class>org.apache.struts2.dispatcher.FilterDispatcher</filter-class>
</filter>
<filter-mapping>
<filter-name>action2</filter-name>
<url-pattern>/*</url-pattern>
</filter-mapping>
web.xml
7
Introduction::HelloWorld, Model
We don’t have public class HelloWorld {

to extend Action
Boss private String message="Hello World. Time is: ";
public String execute() {

message += new Date();
return "success";
}
public String getMessage() {

return message;
}
}
… and no request, action method

response in execute() returns
Boss a result code
8
Introduction::HelloWorld, View
View: HelloWorld.jsp
–Utilizes a single struts taglib
–The taglib is common for JSP, Velocity
and FreeMarker
Prints action’s
<%@ taglib prefix="s" uri="/struts-tags"%>
message property.
<html>
<body>
Unlike struts1,
<s:property value=“message“/> action is a POJO,
</body> and acts as a model
</html>
9
Introduction::HelloWorld
struts.xml:
–Actions mapping links action to view
–Results mapping
<action name=“hello“ class="com.alphacsp.actions.HelloWorld">
<result name=“success“>/pages/HelloWorld.jsp</result>
</action>
Use action name in URL invocation

http://host:port/app/hello.action
10
Agenda
 Introduction
 Background
 Configuration
 View technology
 Page flow
 Form binding
 Table sorting
 Pagination
 Validation
 AJAX
 Error handling
 I18n support
 Documentation
 Summary
11
Background::S2 Vs. S1
Struts2 Struts1
POJO (with execute) Action Extends Action
Model Action Role Controller
Decoupled Servlet API Dependant
Instance per request Threading Single instance
Action JavaBean Form binding Action Form
properties
Value Stack View binding JSP mechanisms
OGNL EL JSTL EL
xml or annotations Validation Action Form
Independent via Lifecycle Shared
interceptors
Wildcards, annotations Configuration Verbose
12
Background::Interceptors
• Actions pre & post processing

mechanism
• Like Spring AOP, EJB3 interceptors
• Interceptors are packed in stacks
• Custom interceptors and stacks can
be added
• No equivalent in Struts1
<action name="phoneBook" class="com.alphacsp.actions.PhoneBook">
<interceptor-ref name="acspStack"/>
<result>/pages/phoneBook.jsp</result>
</action> struts.xml
13
Background::Interceptors
Excerpt from struts-default.xml

<package name="struts-default" abstract="true">
interceptor
<interceptors>
<interceptor name="params" class="…"/>
<interceptor-stack name="basicStack">
<interceptor-ref name="exception"/> interceptor stack
<interceptor-ref name="servletConfig"/> contains other interceptors
<interceptor-ref name="prepare"/>
<interceptor-ref name="checkbox"/>
<interceptor-ref name="params"/>
<interceptor-ref name="conversionError"/>
</interceptor-stack> the default stack
</interceptors> for actions in package
<default-interceptor-ref name="defaultStack"/>
</package> struts-default.xml
14
Background::ValueStack
• The ValueStack is a storage for

request domain model
• Serves as context per request
• “Glues” model and view
• Accessed by interceptors & views
• Stores action properties
• Also stores message bundles
15
Background::OGNL
•ValueStack is referenced and

manipulated by OGNL
•OGNL is also used instead of JSTL
<s:textfield name="contact.email"/> phoneBook.jsp
retrieves email property retrieves localized message

of actions’ contact property using email as key
from stack using OGNL from stack using OGNL
<s:text name="email"/> phoneBook.jsp

16
Background::Other features
• Tag Library
– Form component tags
– Ajax UI component tags
– Control tags: iterator, if/else…
– Data tags: manipulate the ValueStack
• Datatype conversion framework
• Themes: templates for customizing
components markup
17
Background:: Theme example
<s:form action="login" namespace="/" validate="true">

<s:textfield cssClass="loginField" size="25" key="username"/>
<s:password cssClass="loginField" size="25" key="password"/>
<s:submit value="Login" cssClass="button" align="center"/>
</s:form>
login.jsp
Xhtml theme generates

table and validation feedback.
No themes in Struts1
18
Background::Other features
• Reasonable defaults: struts-default

– Result types
– Interceptor stacks
• Actions extending ActionSupport
– facilitates validation
– facilitates localization
• Spring integration
– Dependency Injection interceptor
– Full Spring lifecycle management
19
Agenda
 Introduction
 Background
 Configuration
 View technology
 Page flow
 Form binding
 Table sorting
 Pagination
 Validation
 AJAX
 Error handling
 I18n support
 Documentation
 Summary
20
Features::Action Configuration
action name action method

matched by a URL within action class
(default value: “execute”)
action class
<action name="listEmployees" class="actions.model.Employee" method="list">

<result name="list" type="dispatcher">/WEB-INF/list.jsp</result>
</action>
result name
result type
action method should return
the view technology
a matching result code string
(default value: “dispatcher”
(default value: “success”)
for rendering JSP)
21
Features:: Action Configuration
•Wildcards can be used for mapping

•Mandates naming convention
•Makes XML much less verbose
listEmployees.action is mapped to Employee class and listEmployees.jsp
listDepartments.action is mapped to Department class and listDepartmrnts.jsp
…
<action name="list*s" class="actions.model.{1}" method="list">

<result name="list">/WEB-INF/list{1}s.jsp</result>
</action>
22
Features::Annotation Config.
•Annotation based configuration

–Can make XML utterly redundant
–Struts scans packages for action classes
–Results are expressed via @Result
@Result(name="list", value="/WEB-INF/list.jsp") “list” result code
public class Employee extends ActionSupport is mapped to JSP.
{
public String listEmployees() { By extending ActionSupport,
// business logic goes here Employee is mapped
return "list"; as action by the
} package scanning
} mechanism
23
Features::View technology
• Result types
– JSP : dispatcher
– Velocity
– FreeMarker
– XSLT
– Stream : PDF, MS Word etc.
• Plugins
– JasperReports
– JFreeChart
– JSON
24
Features::Page flow
2
4
3
5
25
Features::Page flow
• User Sends HTTP request

• FilterDispatcher determines appropriate
action
• Interceptors are applied
• Action parameters are set (via params
interceptor)
• Action is being executed
• The Result (view) renders the output
• Optionaly: the view retrieves data from
action
• The result is displayed to the user
26
Features::Form binding
<s:form action="login" validate="true" namespace="/">

<s:textfield cssClass="loginField" key="username"/>
<s:submit key="login" cssClass="button" align="center"/>
</s:form>
login.jsp
Form field parameters

are injected into setter
methods by the params
public class Login { interceptor
private String username;
public void setUsername(String username) {

this.username = username;
}
}
Login.java
27
Features::Table sorting
1. Using Table Tags plugin

– Undocumented
– Looks inactive
– Lack of evidence
2. Using Dojo + JSON
– Too complex
3. YUI DataTable
– Buggy, beta
4. Display tag library
28
Features::Table sorting
From demo application
<display:table class="grid" defaultsort="1" id=“contact" name=“contacts"

pagesize="5" requestURI="phoneBook.acsp" sort="list">
<display:column class="grid" escapeXml="true" headerClass="grid"
property="fullName" title="Name" sortable="true"
defaultorder="ascending"/>
<display:column class="grid" escapeXml="false" headerClass="grid"
title="Email" style="border-left: 1px solid #5680AA;">
<s:textfield value="%{#attr.contact.email}" theme="simple"/>
</display:column>
</display:table> phoneBook.jsp
29
Features::Pagination
Used the display tag library internal

pagination support
– Supports internal and external
pagination
– Forces you to use HTTP GET
– Adds pagination parameter to request
30
Features::Validation
• Uses 12 out-of-box field validators

• Uses expression validators for
complex validations
• Validators can be declared using xml
• Validators can be declared using
annotations
– Field validators for setter methods
– Expression validator for action methods
31
Features::Validation
Annotation vs. xml example

(No annotated version for Struts1)
<validators>
@EmailValidator(
<field name="email">
fieldName = "email",
<field-validator type="email">
key="wrongEmailFormat",
<message key="wrongEmailFormat">
message="Wrong Email Format")
Wrong Email Format
</message>
public void setEmail(String email) {
</field-validator>
this.email = email;
</field>
}
</validators>
PhoneBook.java PhoneBook_validation.xml
32
Features::Client side validation
•Automatic creation of client side

validation
–No client side for expression validators
–Apply a theme for generating error
feedback markup
<s:actionerror cssClass="feedback"/>
<s:form action="login" namespace="/" validate="true" >
<s:textfield cssClass="loginField" size="25" key="username"/>
<s:password cssClass="loginField" size="25" key="password"/>
<s:submit value="Login" cssClass="button" align="center"/>
</s:form>
login.jsp
33
Features::Ajax
• Dojo is embedded for Ajax tags

• Dojo head tag enables JS debugging
• Ajax requests are handled by actions
• DWR integration is enabled via plugin
• YUI integration is enabled via plugin
• Ajax file upload via plugin
• Ajax behaviour for component tags
34
Features::Ajax autocompleter
View
<s:url id="acUrl" action="getDepts"/>
<s:autocompleter name="dept" href="%{acUrl}" cssClass="acSearchField"/>
phoneBook.jsp
Action
privateList<String> ;deptList
action name=""getDepts>
public String execute() {
<class=""DeptsAutoComplete
deptList = service.findAllDepartments();
<result type=""json>
return ActionSupport.SUCCESS;
<param name="root">deptList</param>
}
<result/>
<action/>
public List<String> getDeptList() {
return deptList;
} PhoneBook.java struts-default.xml
35
Features::Error handling
• Validation error feedback tags

– actionerror
– actionmessage
– fielderror: per form field
• Two framework supporting interfaces
– Validatable: for programmatic validation
– ValidationAware: for UI feedback
36
Features::Error handling
•Exception interceptor
–maps exceptions to result error pages
–should be first in interceptor stack


<global-results>
<result name="sysError">/pages/systemError.jsp</result>
</global-results>
<global-exception-mappings>
<exception-mapping exception="java.lang.Exception" result="sysError"/>
</global-exception-mappings>
struts.xml
37
Features::I18N support
• Built on top of Java I18N support

• Bundles can be defined in:
– action.properties
– package.properties
– global resource properties
• Bundles pushed to ValueStack
• Validation errors can be localized
• Locale interceptor to switch locale
38
Features::Documentation
•Apache Struts 2 Documentation

•WIKI
•Struts Showcase
•Plugins
39
Agenda
 Introduction
 Background
 Configuration
 View technology
 Page flow
 Form binding
 Table sorting
 Pagination
 Validation
 AJAX
 Error handling
 I18n support
 Documentation
 Summary
40
Summary::Pros
Extensible plugin framework

Modular and clean architecture
Annotation or xml configuration
Customized lifecycle via interceptors
Neat form & view binding
Easy client side validation
Markup generation with themes
41
Summary::Pros
Fast learning curve

Intuitive
Restful URL action mapper
Easy to test (POJOs) using plugins
DI via lightweight containers
Decoration with tiles, sitemash
42
Summary::Cons
Unorganized documentation
Lack of API documentation
No clear roadmap
ActionSupport dependency
Lack of @Action
Lack of @Interceptor
Cases when fallback to Servlet API is
needed
Weakly typed sessions
43
Summary::When to use
• Use when
– Migrating from legacy framework
– Natural around HTTP request response
paradigm
– Suitable for streaming
– POC, prototype, RAD
• Don’t use when
– Heavily utilized RIA is needed
– Your developers have Swing orientation
44
Thank
You !
45

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Struts2

Reinventing Struts1 Wheel

• Action Based MVC Framework

•First released in Oct. 2006

•Extensible via plugins

We don’t have public class HelloWorld {

public String execute() {

public String getMessage() {

… and no request, action method

Use action name in URL invocation

• Actions pre & post processing

Excerpt from struts-default.xml

• The ValueStack is a storage for

•ValueStack is referenced and

retrieves email property retrieves localized message

<s:text name="email"/> phoneBook.jsp

<s:form action="login" namespace="/" validate="true">

Xhtml theme generates

• Reasonable defaults: struts-default

action name action method

<action name="listEmployees" class="actions.model.Employee" method="list">

•Wildcards can be used for mapping

<action name="list*s" class="actions.model.{1}" method="list">

•Annotation based configuration

• User Sends HTTP request

<s:form action="login" validate="true" namespace="/">

Form field parameters

private String username;

public void setUsername(String username) {

1. Using Table Tags plugin

From demo application

<display:table class="grid" defaultsort="1" id=“contact" name=“contacts"

Used the display tag library internal

• Uses 12 out-of-box field validators

Annotation vs. xml example

•Automatic creation of client side

• Dojo is embedded for Ajax tags

• Validation error feedback tags

• Built on top of Java I18N support

•Apache Struts 2 Documentation

Extensible plugin framework

Fast learning curve

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