JSF 2.2 Tip of the Day: JavaScript Popup Window with Dynamic URL Link

Introduction

There are times when you need to have a JavaScript popup window that opens to another URL based on user input.  The JavaScript is usually added to the onclick event on the JSF component. The dynamic link in JSF is more difficult to accomplish since binding the onclick using Expression Language (EL) is determined at page rendering time. As a result, this means that the JavaScript is not dynamic. As a result, the link is not dynamic either.

A Solution

I have created a project that has three examples that demonstrate the different types of JSF links including the dynamic link. The last example includes <f:param /> elements that are appended to the dynamic URL that is generated.

The dynamic example still uses the onclick event, but the JSF action performs a redirect of the newly opened window. Additionally, and of the parameters that are added to the JSF component are converted to query parameters and appended to the redirect URL.

The Apache Maven project created with NetBeans is located on BitBucket here: jsf-link-examples

The project was tested on GlassFish 4 using Mojarra  JSF 2.2, but the technique should work on other application servers and JSF 2.x versions.

Index.xhtml

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IndexBean.java

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