The Apache Struts Web Application Framework

The Apache Struts Web Application Framework

• I like the simple, concrete forms-based approach
  
• I like the fact that they do not try to solve every concern,
  e.g., persistence
  
• The concept of actions and forwarding is a little too abstract and
  over generalized, however the conventional usage of these seems to
  be clear and concrete enough
  
• I like the option for client-side validation
  
• I like tiles. Would be even better if each tile was well-formed XML.
  
• I like the separation of syntactic validation in the ActionForm
  from semantic validation in the Action.
  
• The names ActionForm and ActionMapping are confusing.
  
• The name="" attribute in should be form="".
  
• The declaritive validator rules seem really awkward
  
• I like the separation of form, action, and page implementation from the
  struts-config.xml file. I think that can lead to reuse and fits
  the diverse skills of the implementation team.
  
• I like the replacement for HTML forms. HTML forms markup sucks.
  Might make it easier to transition to WML, XForms, etc. later.
  
• I like the support for internationalization
  
• The pages with taglibs are more verbose than Velocity was at
  CollabNet, but that is ok. They are well-formed XML.
  
• I like the fact that users cannot directly access .jsp files,
  especially since many jsp files have preconditions to be met.
  
• Tiles could be more cool if they leveraged a directory structure,
  like the way that zope does.
  
• I like the fact that forms and actions are separate. That should
  allow you to separate accessors from mutators at the webapp level
  and make claims about the entire set. E.g., no accessor has any
  side-effect.
  
• Role-based authorization are too simple, but OK for most uses.