Take a look the controllerClass attribute of the definition element in the
tiles config. It allows you to specify a controller class of type package
org.apache.struts.tiles.Controller. This class is executed before the tile
it is associated with is rendered and can be used to dynamically alter the
component context.
I personally would prefer something a little more declarative, something
similar to Cocoon's Selectors.
So you could do something like the following
<select type="someType">
<when test="foo">
<put name="body" value="/foo.jsp"/>
</when>
<otherwise>
<put name="bar" value="/bar.jsp"/>
</otherwise>
</selector>
Dan
----- Original Message -----
From: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Sent: Thursday, December 19, 2002 5:52 PM
Subject: [Tiles] definitionsFactory problem
I'm not sure if this is a user problem or a dev problem or something that
should eventually be submitted as a bug. Let me know if it should really be
posted to the dev list.
Here's what I'm trying to do: I want to be able to parameterize Tiles
definitions with values set in an ActionForward. This allows us to
customize a Tiles definition with specific properties for an action without
extending a Tiles definition. Eventually we could even use it to customize
the definition with runtime properties if we so desired. Consider the
following template def.
<definition name="main.template" path="/template.jsp">
<put name="content" value="/defaultpage.jsp"/>
<put name="menu" value="/menu.jsp"/>
<put name="sidebar" value="/sidebar.jsp"/>
</definition>
To customize this definition to display a customer page we have to do this:
<definition name="cust.td" extends="main.template">
<put name="content" value="/customer.jsp"/>
</definition>
This is fine, except when you have a large application with over 100 screens
or so. Then it would be nice if developers could have just one Tiles
definition as outlined in the main.template definition above and write
action forwards like this:
<forward name="success" path="main.template" class="...">
<set-property property="content" value="/customer.jsp"/>
</forward>
I've gotten this to work by extending and hacking up TilesRequestProcessor.
But it would be much easier if TilesRequestProcessor was written a little
differently. I came up with two major drawbacks with TilesRequestProcessor.
They are:
1) definitionsFactory is private. To extend TilesRequestProcessor, I have
to override all (both) methods that use definitionsFactory and create my own
instance of it. Wouldn't have to do that if the factory was protected.
2) processTilesDefinition() does not have access to the ForwardConfig to
get properties off of it.
So, before I post this to the dev list or create an enhancement request, I
thought I'd ask here:
1. Is there something I missed in the design for making definitionsFactory
private? Is there a good reason for this that I missed or was it just an
oversight to make it private when TilesRequestProcessor was created?
2. Is there a reason the ForwardConfig is not passed into
processDefinitionsFactory? If the interface was changed to pass this object
in, one could override it to take advantage of custom ActionForward
properties.
3. Is there some reason why I shouldn't be doing what I'm trying to do or
is there a better approach?
Thanks,
Greg
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