Faces Servlet

[Suresh Khant]

Hi All ,
I am newbie to jsf , i just want to know what is the meaning of the configuration parameter

<servlet-mapping>
<servlet-name>Faces Servlet</servlet-name>
<url-pattern>*.faces</url-pattern>
</servlet-mapping>

and is it possible to change the extension .faces to something else like .jsp , jsf , xhtml

[Dieter Quickfend]

It means that every request whose request URL ends with '.faces' will be directed to the Faces Servlet, which is a java class declared as a <servlet> element in web.xml.

Sure, you can change it to something else.

[Suresh Khant]

Thanks Dieter Quickfend for your reply ,

but i have made simple example with the configuration parameter

<servlet-mapping>
<servlet-name>Faces Servlet</servlet-name>
<url-pattern>*.faces</url-pattern>
</servlet-mapping>

and the index page is index.jsp

when i tried to access the page using index.jsp i got error

java.lang.RuntimeException: Cannot find FacesContext

and when i accessed it using index.faces it works fine

could you please explain how this happening , frankly i am still not able to understand that

[Tim Holloway]

"index.jsp" does not match your servlet filter pattern. Therefore, the request didn't get routed to the FacesServlet and the container attempted to compile index.jsp and execute it as a plain old JSP. However, since the index.jsp resource referenced JSF resources, it needed a FacesContext.

The FacesContext is created by the FacesServlet to handle the current request. Once the request has been processed, the FacesContext is destroyed. There will be no FacesContext until another request goes through the FacesServlet, at which time the cycle repeats.

It's important to understand the difference between URLs and resources. I'm using Facelets, so my View definition resources have names suffixed with ".xhtml".

Because of the filters I have set in web.xml, a "mypage.jsf" URL will be routed to the FacesServlet, which has been primed to locate resources by ripping the ".jsf" off the URL and replacing it with ".xhtml". So the "mypage.xhtml" resource will be used by the FacesServlet to render the view requested by "myfaces.jsf".