de.xima.fc.plugin.config

Interface IPluginGenericCustomGUI<TBean extends IPluginGenericCustomGUIBean>

Type Parameters:

TBean - Type of the bean class required for this user interface.

All Known Subinterfaces:

IPluginClientDashboard, IPluginCustomGUI, IPluginProjectMenu

public interface IPluginGenericCustomGUI<TBean extends IPluginGenericCustomGUIBean>

Interface for plugins that provide a custom user interface. This requires two components:

• a backing bean with Java code to control the UI, and
• a view in the form of an XHTML page,

Author:

XIMA MEDIA GmbH

Method Summary

Modifier and Type	Method and Description
Iterable<Class<? extends TBean>>	getUnmanagedBeans() This must return a list of backing bean classes that control the user interface and are required by the getXhtmlView().
URL	getXhtmlView() This method must return the path to the XHTML page for the custom user interface.

Method Detail

getUnmanagedBeans

Iterable<Class<? extends TBean>> getUnmanagedBeans()

This must return a list of backing bean classes that control the user interface and are required by the getXhtmlView(). A new instance of the bean will be created automatically when the view is opened. Make sure each bean has got a no-argument constructor or it cannot be instantiated.

Please note that the beans are unmanaged - functionality specific to managed bean is not available. This means, for example, that annotations such as PostConstruct and ManagedProperty are not supported and will not work:

• Instead of PostConstruct, you can use IPluginGenericCustomGUIBean.initialize(de.xima.fc.interfaces.plugin.lifecycle.IPluginInitializeBeanData)
• Instead of ManagedProperty, you can access beans you need via the current FacesContext etc.

Each bean should be annotated with ManagedBean and specify a ManagedBean.name(). If this annotation is not present or no name is specified, the name defaults to the simple name of the bean class.

Also, each bean needs to be annotated one of the following scopes: RequestScoped, ViewScoped, SessionScoped or ApplicationScoped. Note that it depends on the type of plugin which scopes are actually supported. In case you do not specify a scope, an appropriate scope will be determined automatically.

Certain features of managed beans may be supported partially, depending on the type of plugin, but may work differently. This includes, but is not limited to:

• The exact timing at which PostConstruct and PreDestroy are called may differ.
• A ManagedProperty may not work with all values allowed by the Java Beans specification, and may not perform checks such as the check for circular dependencies. It will also not create new beans when those beans have not been created yet as part of the current page.

Returns:

An Iterable over the unmanaged bean classes required by the view

getXhtmlView

URL getXhtmlView()

This method must return the path to the XHTML page for the custom user interface. Usually the XHTML file is part of the JAR resources of the plugin. In this case, you should return an URL to a JAR file resource (jar:file:/...) like so:

 @Override
 public URL getXhtmlView() {
   return getClass().getResource("/path/to/view.xhtml");
 }
 

Returns:

Path to the XHTML view. Must not return null. If you do return null, it will be treated as an error.