Package org.apache.myfaces.orchestra.dynaForm

Defines a DynaForm JSF component that can render a "form" to display/edit/create instances of some persistent entity.

See:
Description

Package org.apache.myfaces.orchestra.dynaForm Description

Defines a DynaForm JSF component that can render a "form" to display/edit/create instances of some persistent entity.

The DynaForm makes it easy to implement "data entry" type applications, where the main purpose of many views is to perform simple database manipulations.

Note that (unlike some other parts of Orchestra) this package is jsf-specific.

TODO: add nice way for Orchestra introspection to controllably cascade down into referenced objects. In particular, where a record has a foreign key to a static "lookup" table (eg "units" or "department") it would be nice to be able to render data from fields on the referenced object inline in the parent. Editing is a little trickier; it is the foreign-key that needs to be updated, not the displayed field. Maybe each such linked-field could be rendered as link that pops up a window to select a different record? These records would always be N:1 relations of course.

Displaying linked data that is not a "lookup table" should also be possible, and editing fields on those records should be fairly easy. Not sure that allowing editing of fields where the relation is anything other than 1:1 is a good idea though.

TODO: add an "extensible object" framework where a proxy is auto-generated to allow properties to be added to a model object. There are two forms of enhancement: joined records and transformed data. When in display-only mode both of these are pretty straight-forward. Of course DynaForm will then need to know how to merge the persistence data for two objects. Editing a field that exists on a linked object should be reasonably straight-forward.