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JSF Spearheads Drive Toward J2EE Simplication, Says Kito Mann

JSF Spearheads Drive Toward J2EE Simplication, Says Kito Mann
By Java News Desk
Article Rating:
March 7, 2004 12:00 AM EST
Reads:
 18,403
Kito D. Mann, writing at the site he founded devoted to JSF, says that the whole JavaServer Faces initiative is at the center of a much larger goal of the Java community: simplification.

Writing on the occasion of the release this week of the JavaServer Faces 1.0 specification, over two years in the making, Mann defines JSF as "a set of APIs that facilitate component-oriented, event-driven Web development."

"It represents the standardization of dozens of efforts in the Java community to simplify the task of building Web applications," he adds.

"Any time the community builds dozens of solutions to a problem, there is an obvious need, and fulfilling such a need can lead to huge productivity gains. Since so much application development these days is Web development, enhanced productivity in this space is a Big Deal," Mann continues. "Individual frameworks can increase productivity, but when the majority of the community supports a single framework, the force of the gain is multiplied. A good example of this is the support for Struts in tools, other frameworks, and books. In effect, Struts is the de-facto standard, and its heavy industry support has intensified its utility."

JSF, Mann explains, is an attempt to bring Struts-level momentum to a framework that focuses on the user interface side of things.

He also underlines the role of JSF in a Java vs .NET perspective:


"If this vision of powerful visually-oriented IDEs with a full-fledged user interface component model sounds familiar, this is certainly not an accident. Make no mistake: JSF is a direct competitor to Microsoft ASP.NET WebForms, which enjoys tight integration with Visual Studio.NET. More importantly, JSF is an attempt to fill a hole in the standard Java stack - a hole that .NET has had fully fleshed out since day one.

JavaServer Faces is also at the center of a much larger goal of the Java community, also partially fueled by competition with .NET: simplification. You've seen this spun in different ways, like 'targeting corporate developers,' 'simpler Java,' and so on. Since most business applications today are web applications, this means 'simplify Web development.' So no matter how complex some may think JSF is, using it is quite the opposite, and I think it can deliver its promise."

Mann believes sufficiently in the central role that JSF will play to found JSF Central aimed at keeping developers abreast of JavaServer Faces technology and helping all those involved - from front-end and application developers to those developing components, tools, and implementations - exchange information and grow.

Published March 7, 2004 – Reads 18,403
Copyright © 2004 SYS-CON Media, Inc. — All Rights Reserved.
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Most Recent Comments
Marc 03/11/04 02:44:57 PM EST

JSF is a great approach. I have been using it for the past few months and find it to be so much better than anything else in Java Web development. Very comparable to .Net Web Forms. I have used the Sun Java Creator Studio Technology Edition. While it still has some buggy-ness to it (as to be expected in a technology release), I think this tool will be on par with Visual Studio .Net for the ability to rapidly create web application. Vic''s post shows the needs for a unified front. Who wants to sit through 8 speakers to here the same thing about MVC but with different frameworks. Unify on JSF and try to change it in the next release if things are up to your liking. Craig McClanahan and his team have done a great job and input from the developer community will help shape this technology to be very cometitive with ASP.Net.
Vic 03/07/04 02:26:59 PM EST

There is a seminar coming up where MacroMedia will present its alternative to JSF.
Ann: North East Conference on MVC Frameworks and Struts in 3 weeks:
Most people already know what MVC is, once you know what it is, here is the next step. Presenting will be the popular frameworks and components in use by 8 speakers:

-Ted Husted  Author  Ted Husted, senior Struts Committer, walks through a new version of the original Struts example, updated to take advantage of the latest features in Struts 1.2 and accepted best practices.
Husted.com

-Rod Johnson  Author  EJB/Spring
springFrameWork.com

-Christophe Coenraets  Flex-MacroMedia - back to rich UI w/SOA (Great blog entry on Struts + Flex)
markMe.com/cc

-Howard Lewis Ship  Author  HiveMind (SOA, IOC, AOP)  commonly referred to as the next big thing
javaTapestry.blogspot.com

-Clinton Begin  DAO/iBatis/SQLMaps  the best DAO layer
imo, used by Spring, jPetStore, basicPortal, etc.

-Matt Raible  Author  displayTag/strutsMenu  (displayTag is my favorite J2EE component)
Raibledesigns.com

-Jason Carreira  WebWork 2
freeroller.net/page/jCarreira

- Vic Cekvenich  Author  basicPortal (J2EZ  easy and simple to customize application for membership, portal, cms, community, store, etc. using bestPractices for large, profitable commercial sites. )

+ more
You will get a CD mailed to you once you register.

April 3rd from 8AM to 7PM in NYC at nyhotel.com, next to MSG. Advertised in JDJ, NY Times, etc. My guess is that you wont find half as many good sessions at Suns Java One.
It $99 to register now at baseBeans.com, in a few day''s price keeps going up.
Vinay Soni 03/04/04 09:49:12 PM EST

I agree with Kito 100% I have used JSF for only a few months but find it to be really great. It has simplified web development extremely for me.

Now configuration files can only be a good thing. It indicates that something that can be externalized had been properly abstracted out as configuration. It is not in code but out of it.

The next thing that will happen is that these configuration files will bet populated from GUI dev tools where u will be able to paint the gui like .net forms or vb

I was thinking about posting some code here to show how much can be accomplished by writing just a few lines of code in JSF. But I think that may not be appropriate.

But try it out for yourself and then you will be glued to it. There are already Tree control / Tabbed Panes and Table controls available. I am already embedding number of JS controls like calendar in my apps. The results are great. And the essence of it is less development effort and better design and maintainable applications.

After being in Beta and EA4 it is really great to have a version 1.

VInay Soni
Dave Wilson 03/04/04 09:32:16 PM EST

I think we''ll see that Sun''s Java Studio Creator tool is, in some sense, an IDE for creating web apps using JSF (and JDBC Row Sets). JSCreator should hide the complexity of JSF and make it easy to build dynamic web apps. Sun is helping us.
Francisco D''Anconia 03/04/04 09:00:58 AM EST

It represents the standardization of dozens of efforts in the Java community to simplify the task of building Web applications? Yikes.

I''m left wondering if Kito actually bothered looking at some of the ways to build webapps in Java, or if he used Struts and was left with the idea that there had to be a better way. If so, JSF isn''t it. JSF adds to the configuration hell you learn to hate in struts. That''s not an improvement. That''s worse.

Wrong direction, SUN!! You''re supposed to be helping us, not hurting us by trying to emulate the compatition!