Following up on some other threads, here's some things we might consider for a future release
* Attaching a ViewHelper to an ActionForward.
** The ViewHelper (aka ViewController, aka ProxyAction, aka
SetupGizmo) would be able to access the contexts before the
ActionForward fires. It would *not* be able to select a different
ActionForward on its own, but it *would* be able to throw an Exception
that could be caught by the declarative ExceptionHandler. (Perhaps as
a Filter?)
** The sticky part here is that we would like to separate the concern,
but we also need to handle any errors that might occur when addressing
the concern. We need to be clear that it is the Action's role to
select the next view -- not the ViewController.
** Other names for this component might be ViewProxy, PageProxy, or PageDelegate
What would this do differently from the chain which can be attached to a ForwardConfig? Note that as that is implemented now, nothing would stop someone from replacing the ForwardConfig in the ActionContext during the implementation of that chain -- if you think that's important, we might want to consider what walls need to be put up.
* Easy ActionForm instantiation.
** An Action or ViewHelper should be able to easily instantiate an ActionForm given only the logical name of an Action or ActionForward.
I'd target this for 1.3.x, even if not 1.3.0. It's simple, unless we defer it to the creation of a StrutsApplication bean which contains all of the application-scoped components of Struts. I'd actually call that a good target for 1.4, but with the possibility of adding some interim util type method sooner for the simple act of "findActionForm(ActionContext ac, String name, String scope)" or "actionContext.findActionForm(String name, String scope)"
* Dynamic target for html:form.
** It's often useful to retarget a form for a different mapping. We should be able to set an attribute that will target an html:form for another mapping. This can be done with RTE, but it's messy. ** There was an old ticket for a taglib enhancement that would let us "back" all the attributes with a JavaBean. There was a cold reception at the time, but I keep thinking it might be a good way to pass in whateverr attributes people might need without resorting to RTEs ** An IOC container might be helpful if implemeting a taglib backing bean..
I don't really understand this use case. unless the contents of <html:form> are hyper-dynamic, you'd need the same form bean to back it, even if upon submit the thing actually goes to a different action. I am familiar with the use case that would change the destination of the "action" property of the form using JavaScript, but I think you're talking about something different.
Joe
--
Joe Germuska [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://blog.germuska.com "Narrow minds are weapons made for mass destruction" -The Ex
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