Foreign Templating Framework"

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Here describes how to make a ZUL page to be assembled with Ajax in a foreign templating framework,
 
Here describes how to make a ZUL page to be assembled with Ajax in a foreign templating framework,
 
such as [http://tiles.apache.org/ Apache Tiles].
 
such as [http://tiles.apache.org/ Apache Tiles].
 +
 +
Notice that  you could skip this chapter if you assemble UI at the server by use of Servlet's inclusion (javax.servlet.RequestDispatcher's include), since ZK will handle it automatically.
  
 
ZK supports many powerful layout components, such as portallayout, borderlayout, tablelayout, columnlayout and so on<ref>For more information, please refer to [[ZK Component Reference]].</ref>. It is recommended to use them. Of course, read this chapter only if you prefer to use other templating framework.
 
ZK supports many powerful layout components, such as portallayout, borderlayout, tablelayout, columnlayout and so on<ref>For more information, please refer to [[ZK Component Reference]].</ref>. It is recommended to use them. Of course, read this chapter only if you prefer to use other templating framework.

Revision as of 05:14, 17 October 2010


DocumentationZK Developer's ReferenceIntegrationPresentation LayerForeign Templating Framework
Foreign Templating Framework


Employment/Purpose

Here describes how to make a ZUL page to be assembled with Ajax in a foreign templating framework, such as Apache Tiles.

Notice that you could skip this chapter if you assemble UI at the server by use of Servlet's inclusion (javax.servlet.RequestDispatcher's include), since ZK will handle it automatically.

ZK supports many powerful layout components, such as portallayout, borderlayout, tablelayout, columnlayout and so on[1]. It is recommended to use them. Of course, read this chapter only if you prefer to use other templating framework.

  1. ↑ For more information, please refer to ZK Component Reference.

Prerequisite

DOCTYPE

To use ZK components correctly, the templating page must specify DOCTYPE as follows. 

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN"
 "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd">

<html>
...

Browser Cache

Though optional, it is suggested to disable the browser to cache the result page. It can be done as follows. 

<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">
  <head>
    <meta http-equiv="Pragma" content="no-cache" />
    <meta http-equiv="Expires" content="-1" />

Make a ZUL page as a fragment

By default, if a ZUL page is requested by the browser directly, it will generate a complete HTML structure, including HTML, HEAD and BODY tags. On the other hand, if the assembling is done by inclusion (javax.servlet.RequestDispatcher's include), a ZUL page will be generated as a HTML fragment without HTML, HEAD, and BODY. For example, if a ZUL page is included by jsp:include, then it won't generate HTML/HEAD/BODY, such that the following JSP page will be rendered correctly. 

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN"
 "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd">
<%-- a JSP page --%>
<html>
  <body>
    <jsp:include page="frag.zul"/>
...

In other words, if the result page is assembled when the request is received, you don't need to do anything specially[1]. However, if the assembling is done at the client side by using Ajax to request fragments after loaded, you have to read the following section.

  1. ↑ You might take a look at Use ZK in JSP for more information.

Request a ZUL page with Ajax

If the templating assembles the page at the client side by using Ajax to get back each fragment, the ZUL page has to do the following:

  1. Specify <?page complete="true" docType=""?> to disable the generation of HTML/HEAD/BODY and DOCTYPE
  2. Use the native DIV (<n:div xmlns:n="native">) to enclose the whole content.

For example, 

<?page complete="true" docType=""?>
<n:div xmlns:n="native">
  <window title="whatever content you want"/>
  ...
</n:div>

Thus, the generated HTML structure won't contain HTML/HEAD/BODY/DOCTYPE and the templating framework would assemble it easily by use of, say, JavaScript's outerHTML or jQuery's replaceWith.

Of course, if the fragment itself is a JSP page and then use inclusion to include a ZUL page (or use ZK JSP Tags), then the generated HTML structure is already a correct HTML fragment (and you don't need to anything described above).

ID Generator

Each ZUL page we request by Ajax as described above will be an independent desktop. It means the browser window will have several desktops, if we assemble UI this way. Thus, the component's UUID must be unique across different desktops (of the same session[1]). The default ID generator can handle it well.

However, if you use a customized IdGenerator, you have to generate component's UUID (IdGenerator.nextComponentUuid(Desktop, Component)) correctly. A typical trick is to encode desktop's ID as part of component's UUID.

  1. ↑ In short, component's UUID must be unquie in the same session. It is OK to be duplicated in different session.

Communicate among ZUL pages

If a ZUL page is loaded separately with Ajax, an independent desktop is created. For example, the following HTML page will create three desktops. 

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN"
 "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd">
<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">
<head>
<meta http-equiv="Pragma" content="no-cache" />
<meta http-equiv="Expires" content="-1" />
<script type="text/javascript"
	src="http://code.jquery.com/jquery-1.4.2.js"></script>

<title>Assembling at the client with Ajax</title>
</head>
<body>
<table>
	<tr>
		<td id="top" colspan="2">top</td>
	</tr>
	<tr>
		<td id="left">left</td>
		<td id="right">right</td>
	</tr>
</table>
<script>
	$(function() {
		$.get("/frags/banner.zul", 
				{width : "600px"}, 
				function(response) {
				  $("#top").html(response);
		    }
		);
		$.get("/frags/leftside.zul",
				{width : "300px"},
			  function(response) {
				  $("#left").html(response);
			  }
		);
		$.get("/frags/rightside.zul",
		    {width : "300px"},
		    function(response) {
		      $("#right").html(response);
		    }		
		);
	});
</script>
</body>
</html>

Since they are in different desktops, you have to use the group-scoped event queue[1] if you want to send events from one desktop (such as leftside.zul) to another (such as rightside.zul). For more information, please refer to Event Queues.

  1. ↑ The group-scoped event queue is available only in ZK EE. For ZK CE, you have to use the session-scoped event queue.

Version History

Version Date Content
5.0.5 October, 2010 ZUL page is able to be generated as a HTML fragment.



Last Update : 2010/10/17

Copyright © Potix Corporation. This article is licensed under GNU Free Documentation License.


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