Question

I am trying to develop custom control in JSF 1.2 (using facelets).

I followed steps from different tutorials (defining .tld, taglib.xml, registered component in faces-config.xml and implementing UIComponent (component renders itself) and UIComponentELTag classes) and my component is rendered, I have value bound to it, but attributes I defined for that tag are ignored. I logged various methods in Tag class and noticed that none of the methods is ever called.

What am I missing? Is there a reason Tag handler class is never invoked?

Thanks in advance.

My taglib.xml file is:

<?xml version="1.0"?> 
<!DOCTYPE facelet-taglib PUBLIC 
  "-//Sun Microsystems, Inc.//DTD Facelet Taglib 1.0//EN"
  "java.sun.com/dtd/facelet-taglib_1_0.dtd">
<facelet-taglib> 
  <namespace>dynamissoft.com/entities/ui</namespace>
  <tag>
    <tag-name>legalEntityView</tag-name>
    <component>
      <component-type>rs.bozic.wastemanager.LegalEntityView</component-type>
    </component>
  </tag>
</facelet-taglib> 

Answer 1

Have you tried creating a custom component using facelets (xml only). That’s the most easy way, using facelets, usually, the different java classes aren’t needed anymore.

Very rough overview:

• Create facelet xml file (like myComponent.xhtml)
• Register in the facelet inside a taglib (which in turn should be defined in the web.xml)
• Optionally, create some support beans in Java

You can pass values/beans to your component using normal tag paramets:

Using the component

Inside the component

Param1 is just printed: #{myParam2}
Param2 used as value for table

…

There are excellent tutorials on Google, like the one from IBM.

If possible, consider using JSF 2.0. Facelets are integrated, and you have more flexibility to create your custom components. I created a blog posting a while ago on that: http://blog.whitehorses.nl/2010/02/08/jsf-2-0/ (or Google yourself)