JSF Tables with checkboxes

[Patrick Fong]

Hi

I was wondering if someone could give me some pointers on constructing and processing checkboxes in a database table. I'm using JSF 1.2 and Tomahawk. Here is my JavaBean -

    
public class Activity implements Serializable {
	
	/** serial version unique id  */
	private static final long serialVersionUID = 2955470182812576507L;

	/** name of activity */
	String name;
	/** importance of the activity */
	int importance;
	/** type of activity */
	int type;
	/** activity notes */
	String notes;
	/** creator object of the activity  */
	String creatorID;
	/** created date of the activity */
	Date createdDate = new Date();
	/** edited date of the activity */
	Date editedDate = new Date();
	/** system identity of the current activity */
	int systemID;
	/** start time */
	int startTime;
	/** duration of the activity */
	int duration;
	/** context of the current activity */
	String context;
	/** status of the activity */
	int status;
     
       //not enclosed are the accessors 
}

Here is my backing bean

    
public class AssociatedAttributeBean {

	/** user identity */
	String userID;
	/** location identity */
	String locationID;
	/** attribute identity */
	int attributeID = 1;
	/** associatedAttribute for the current bean */
	AssociatedAttribute associatedAttribute;
	/** attribute for this AssociatedAttribute */
	Attribute attribute;

	/** logic implementation component */
	DwaLogic logicImpl;
//	DwaLogic logicImpl = (DwaLogic) ComponentManager.getInstance().get("org.sakaiproject.dwa.logic.DwaLogic");
	/** external logic component */
	ExternalLogic externalLogic;
	
	/** activities planning items */
	List<SelectItem> selectPlanningItems;
	/** activities doing items */
	List<SelectItem> selectDoingItems;
	/** activities done items */
	List<SelectItem> selectDoneItems;
	/** data model for planning activities */
	DataModel dataModelPlanning;
	/** data model for doing activities */
	DataModel dataModelDoing;
	/** data model for done activities */
	DataModel dataModelDone;
	
	
	/** current planning activity */
	UIData currentPlanningActivity;
	/** current doing activity */
	UIData currentDoingActivity;
	/** current done activity */
	UIData currentDoneActivity;

       //not enclosed are the accessor methods for the properties, and the DB logic 

What I need to do is list down all possible PLANNING, DOING and DONE activities. Then I want to select the checkboxes of the assigned activities of the fore-mentioned types. Then I want to be able to process the assigned and un-assigned activities.

This is where I'm not sure as I'm a JSF newbie. This is my attempt at writing the JSF page. Needless to say, it doesn't quite work the way it should. (This is only for PLANNING activities). Should there be a binding

   
<t:dataTable renderedIfEmpty="false" cellpadding="2" cellspacing="1"
   value="#{AssociatedAttributeBean.dataModelPlanning}" var="currentRow" width="100%">

   <h:column >
       <t:selectBooleanCheckbox forceId="true" id="chk" onclick="onChangeSelect(this);"
        value="#{AssociatedAttributeBean.possiblePlanningActivities}" />
       <f:facet name="header">
           <h:outputText value="Selected"/>
       </f:facet>
  </h:column>

 <h:column>
          <h:outputText value="#{currentRow.name}"/> 
 </h:column>

</t:dataTable>

My questions are

How do you write the JSF page to list activities of each type with checkboxes? How do I include assigned activities?

How do you process the check boxes or reference the checkboxes that are checked?

What should be in the constructor for AssociatedAttributeBean?

Cheers
Patrick

[Bauke Scholtz]

Inside an UIData component you should bind every component value to a property of the iterated row object, not to the parent backing bean. Otherwise the property of the parent backing bean will simply be overwritten everytime from up to the value of the last row. In this case you need to move the 'possiblePlanningActivities' property to the 'Activity' class and bind the value of the checkbox with #{currentRow.possiblePlanningActivities} instead.

Another alternative is to bind it to a Map<TypeOfUniqueRowIdentifier, Boolean> property of the backing bean, where in TypeOfUniqueRowIdentifier should hold the value which represents the unique ID of the object behind "currentRow", the 'Activity' class. In this case I assume that the 'name' property is unique, so make 'possiblePlanningActivities' a Map<String, Boolean> property in the backing bean and bind the value of the checkbox with #{AssociatedAttributeBean.possiblePlanningActivities[currentRow.name]}. On checked rows, the Boolean property will evaluate to true.