Re: Moer about struts -- WEB400

Joe,

On the one hand you are concerned about the complexity of 
struts and on the other you seem concerned about features. 
Struts doesn't prevent you from performing lower to upper 
case conversion. It also doesn't prevent you from supporting 
command keys. It just doesn't provide that as part of the base 
package because that is application specific and easily added.

Supporting everything that anyone might want leads to bloat. 
It is also a problem if the framework prevents you from 
supporting features like lower-to-upper or makes implementing 
features like that difficult. I can assure you that if lower-to-upper 
or command key support is not prevented by struts and is 
easy to implement via the standard tags.

Remember that HTML forms only support character values, so 
you have issues with anything that is not string. That is an 
HTML limitation, not a struts limitation. You could supply a 
decorator for your string or go with something more full 
featured. For example, I use a set of classes for numeric 
values that allows me to get around some of html and CSS' 
limitations. 

The plan is follow M.C. and separate your logic to minimize rework 
when support for a better view comes along but don't force 
immediate adoption. Only a medadata driven view or automated 
refactoring insulates you from this. I believe that your PBD tool 
provides the second option for RPG applications moving to 
a web view.

David Morris  

>>> joepluta@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 10/9/2003 2:37:30 PM >>>
> From: David Morris
> 
> Some refactoring will be necessary to take advantage of JSF in
> Struts applications, however there is a plan in place and that
> plan is much more likely minimize changes. I agree that custom
> tags are the weak link of Struts. Their main weakness is that they
> cannot be used easily in metadata driven applications. Their
> strength is that they do provide all the support 99% of
> application developers need and nicely encapsulate display
> functionality.

99% of the functionality you need, perhaps.  Not nearly that for me. 
No
client-side editing.  No lower-to-upper case support.  No command
keys.
In fact, nothing above what HTML provides, which is why I say it's
simply another syntax, and a restrictive one at that.

Plus, it has entire sets of tags (such as redirect) which have little
or
no business in a JSP.

My opinion, but as far as I can tell Struts is simply a different way
of
doing the same thing, and less flexible to boot.  And given the fact
that they even NEED a "plan" to "minimize changes" tells me that this
is
just another "Flavor of the Moment".  Again, my opinion, but we'll see
how much support Struts has in a year.

Joe