com.sun.rave.web.ui.component
Class CheckboxBase

java.lang.Object
  extended byjavax.faces.component.UIComponent
      extended byjavax.faces.component.UIComponentBase
          extended byjavax.faces.component.UIOutput
              extended byjavax.faces.component.UIInput
                  extended bycom.sun.rave.web.ui.component.SelectorBase
                      extended bycom.sun.rave.web.ui.component.Selector
                          extended bycom.sun.rave.web.ui.component.RbCbSelectorBase
                              extended bycom.sun.rave.web.ui.component.RbCbSelector
                                  extended bycom.sun.rave.web.ui.component.CheckboxBase
All Implemented Interfaces:
javax.faces.component.EditableValueHolder, SelectorManager, javax.faces.component.StateHolder, javax.faces.component.ValueHolder
Direct Known Subclasses:
Checkbox

public abstract class CheckboxBase
extends RbCbSelector

Use the ui:checkbox tag to display a checkbox in the rendered HTML page. The tag can be used as a single checkbox or as one checkbox among a group of checkboxes. A group of checkboxes represents a multiple selection list which can have any number of checkboxes selected, or none selected. A checkbox can represent a value of a class type such as Boolean, Byte, Character, Double, Float, Integer, Long, Short, String or the primitive form of one of these class types. A checkbox may also represent an application defined object value.

A Boolean value is useful for indicating whether an item, such as a table row, is selected. A String value is useful for passing values for checkbox selections made in the interface. An application defined Object value or class instance can be used to hold more information related to a checkbox selection.

A single checkbox can be used to represent several types of data:

A group of checkboxes can be used to represent:

Note: Another tag for rendering checkboxes is ui:checkboxGroup, which imposes a grid layout on a group of checkboxes. The checkbox tag is useful in situations where the checkboxGroup tag layout is not desirable, such as in a table row.

Detecting a selected checkbox

The checkbox tag uses both the selected and selectedValue attributes to pass information about the checkbox's selection status. The selected attribute is used to indicate that the checkbox is selected, and should have a check mark displayed in the page. The selectedValue attribute is used to pass a data value for the checkbox. A checkbox is considered to be selected when the value of the selected attribute is equal to the value of the selectedValue attribute. You can display a checkbox as selected on the initial viewing of the page by assigning the same value to the selectedValue and the selected attributes.

If the selectedValue attribute is not specified or its value is null then the checkbox behaves like a boolean control. If the checkbox is selected, the value of the selected attribute is a true Boolean instance. If the checkbox is not selected, the value of the selected attribute will be a false Boolean instance.

Note that a value binding expression that evaluates to a primitive value can be assigned to the selected and selectedValue attributes.

When checkboxes are part of a group, an ArrayList of selected checkboxes is maintained. If any checkboxes within a group are selected, a request attribute whose name is the value of the name attribute is created and added to the RequestMap. The request attribute value is an ArrayList containing the value of the selectedValue attribute of each selected checkbox. If no checkboxes are selected, no request attribute is created. The selected attribute of each selected checkbox within the group will also contain the value of the selectedValue attribute of the respective selected checkbox.

The Checkbox class provides a convenience method for obtaining the selected checkboxes in a group:

public static ArrayList getSelected(String groupName);

where groupName is the value of the name attribtue. Note that unlike the selected and selectedValue attributes, the return value of this method is always an ArrayList of class instances and not primitive values.

Using a checkbox tag as a boolean control

If the selectedValue attribute is not specified or its value is null then the checkbox behaves like a boolean control.

To use the checkbox tag as a boolean control, do not specify a value for the selectedValue attribute. The checkbox is selected if the selected attribute is not null and has the value of a true Boolean instance or a boolean primitive value. If the checkbox is not selected, then the value of the selected attribute is a false Boolean instance or boolean primitive.

Normally the value of the selectedValue attribute is specified as the value of the <input> HTML element. When a checkbox is behaving as a boolean control the value of the <input> element is the clientId of the checkbox.

Note that using a boolean checkbox in a group and referencing the request attribute for the selected checkboxes is not useful, since the value of the request attribute will be an ArrayList of indistinguishable true values.

Using a checkbox tag to represent an application defined value

The selectedValue attribute can be assigned an application defined object value to represent the value of a selected checkbox. If the checkbox is selected, the value of the selected attribute is assigned the value of the selectedValue attribute.

If the value of the selectedValue attribute is an application defined object, a converter must be registered to convert to and from a String value. The converter is used to encode the checkbox value as the value of the HTML <input> element and to decode the submitted value in a request. In addition the object must support an equals method that returns true when the value of the selectedValue attribute is compared to the selected attribute value in order to detect a selected checkbox.

Using a checkbox tag as one control in a group

The name attribute determines whether a checkbox is part of a group. A checkbox is treated as part of a group of checkboxes if the name attribute of the checkbox is assigned a value equal to the name attribute of the other checkboxes in the group. In other words, all checkboxes of a group have the same name attribute value. The group behaves like a multiple selection list, where zero or more checkboxes can be selected. The value of the name attribute must be unique within the scope of the <form> element containing the checkboxes.

Facets

The following facets are supported:

Examples

Example 1: Single boolean checkbox with value binding.

<ui:checkbox id="cb1" selected="#{tldRbCbExample.selectedCb1}"/>

The value binding #{tldRbCbExample.selectedCb1} implies that there are two methods implemented in the tldRbCbExample managed bean.

The getSelectedCb1 method will be called to determine the checked state of the checkbox during rendering.
When the tag is first rendered, its initial checked state is determined by the return value of getSelectedCb1. If it returns true the checkbox will be checked on the HTML page and not checked if it returns false
When the checkbox is checked by the user the setSelectedCb1 method will be called with a boolean argument equal to true. When it is unchecked the method will be called with a boolean argument equal to false.

No image or label will be displayed by this example.

Example 2: Single boolean checkbox with value binding, that displays an image and a label.

<ui:checkbox id="cb2" selected="#{tldRbCbExample.selectedCb2}" imageURL="tree_server.gif label="Server"/>

The behavior of this checkbox is the same as example one.
In this example an image and a label are displayed next to the checkbox. Both the imageURL and label attributes may be assigned value binding expressions instead of literal values.

Example 3: Single String valued checkbox with value binding.

<ui:checkbox id="cb3" label="Printer" selectedValue="Printer" selected="#{tldRbCbExample.selectedCb3}"/>

The value binding #{tldRbCbExample.selectedCb3} implies that there are two methods implemented in the tldRbCbExample managed bean. Because the selectedValue attribute is a String the expected method signatures will be:

The getSelectedCb3 method will be called to determine the checked state of the checkbox during rendering.
When the tag is first rendered, its initial checked state is determined by the return value of getSelectedCb3. With a String valued checkbox, this checkbox will be checked only if the getSelectedCb3 method returns "Printer", since that is the value of the checkbox as dictated by the selectedValue="Printer" attribute. If the getSelectedCb3 method returns anything else, the checkbox will not be checked.
When the checkbox is checked by the user the setSelectedCb3 method will be called with a String argument equal to "Printer". When it is unchecked the method will be called with a null String argument.

Example 4: Single Object valued checkbox with value bindings and a label.

<ui:checkbox id="cb4" label="Printer" selectedValue="#{tldRbCbExample.selectedValueCb4}" selected="#{tldRbCbExample.selectedCb4}" converter="#{tldRbCbExample.printerConverter}"/>

The value bindings #{tldRbCbExample.selectedCb4} and #{tldRbCbExample.selectedValueCb4} imply the following methods are implemented in the tldRbCbExample managed bean. Let's say the object value is an instance of the "Printer" class, then the expected method signatures will be:

A Printer class might look like:

     public static class Printer {
 	private String name;
 	private String location;
 	
 	public Printer(String name, String location) {
 	    this.name = name;
 	    this.location = location;
 	}
 	public String getName() {
 	    return name;
 	}
 	public String getLocation() {
 	    return location;
 	}
 	public boolean equals(Printer p) {
 	    return this.name.equals(p.getName()) &&
 		    this.location.equals(p.getLocation());
 	}
     };
 

Since this is an application defined object value, the application must supply a converter, as indicated in the example. The converter attribute's value binding expression implies a method in the tldRbCbExample managed bean called

public Converter getPrinterConverter();.

The converter class might look like:
     public class PrinterConverter implements javax.faces.convert.Converter {
 	public PrinterConverter() {
 	}
 	public String getAsString(FacesContext context, 
 		UIComponent component, Object value) {
 	    if (!(value instanceof Printer)) {
 		throw new ConverterException("Not a Printer value");
 	    }
 	    return ((Printer)value).getName();
 	}
 	public Object getAsObject(FacesContext context, 
 		UIComponent component, String value) {
 	    if (!value.equals("printer1")) {
 		throw new ConverterException("Unrecognized printer: " + value);
 	    }
 	    return printerDb.getPrinter("printer1");
 	}
     };
 

The getSelectedCb4 method will be called to determine the checked state of the checkbox during rendering.
When the tag is first rendered, its initial state is determined by the return value of getSelectedCb4. With an Object valued checkbox, this checkbox will be checked only if the getSelectedCb4 method returns a Printer instance that equals the Printer instance returned by the getSelectedValueCb4 method.
If the getSelectedCb4 method returns a Printer instance that is not equal as determined by getSelectedValueCb4().equals(getSelectedCb4()) the checkbox will not be checked.
When the checkbox is checked by the user the setSelectedCb4 method will be called with the Printer instance returned by the converter.

Example 5: Grouped Integer valued checkboxes in a table.

The following example shows a common use case for checkboxes in a table. The checkboxes are used to select zero or more rows for processing. The checkbox state does not need to be stored. The selected row indexes can be obtained directly as Integer values from the ArrayList of selected checkboxes maintained by the checkbox in the action callback #{tldRbCbExample.table5process}.
The markup in bold is how you would specify a checkbox tag for this purpose. The selectedValue value binding, #{tldRbCbExample.currentRow1} is implemented to return the current row in the table5row1 tableRow tag.

     <ui:table id="table5">
 	<ui:tableRow id="table5row1"
 	    sourceData="#{tldRbCbExample.table5row1data}"
 	    sourceVar="table5data"
 	    binding="#{tldRbCbExample.table5row1}">
 	    <ui:tableColumn id="col1">
 
 		<f:facet name="header">
 		    <ui:tableHeader id="header1"
 			deselectAllButton="true"
 			selectAllButton="true"
 			selectId="cb5"/>
 		</f:facet>
 
 		
 		<ui:checkbox id="cb5" name="cb5Grp" 
 			selectedValue="#{tldRbCbExample.currentRow1}">
 		</ui:checkbox>
 		
 
 	    </ui:tableColumn>
 	    <ui:tableColumn id="col2">
 		<f:facet name="header">
 		    <ui:staticText text="Application Data"/>
 		</f:facet>
 
 		<ui:staticText text="#{table5data.text}"/>
 
 	    </ui:tableColumn>
 	</ui:tableRow>
 	<f:facet name="tableActionsBottom">
 	   <ui:button id="table5process"
 		action="#{tldRbCbExample.table5process}"
 		text="Process Checked"/>
 	</f:facet>
     </ui:table>
 

See ui:table for details on using the <ui:table> tag and other table child tags and facets.

Normally when checkboxes are contained within a ui:tableRow the application MUST provide a value binding for the selected attribute and any attribute that is expected to maintain its state. This is because the table only creates a single instance of the checkbox for all rows. It depends on a model to provide the storage for the attribute values, as it iterates over the rows in the dataset.
In this example, we don't need to maintain the state across requests because the rows just need to be selected for processing. Once the processing is complete, the checkbox no longer needs to be checked.

The following code shows how the table5process action method obtains the selected checkbox values from the request map. It calls a static member on Checkbox to return the ArrayList

public static ArrayList getSelected(String groupName)

     public void table5process() {
 
 	// Checkbox.getSelected(String groupName) is
 	// a static convenience method that obtains the 
 	// ArrayList of selected checkboxes from the request map
 	// ONLY when the checkboxes are part of a group.
 	//
 	ArrayList al = Checkbox.getSelected("cb5Grp");
 	if (al != null) {
 	    ListIterator li = al.listIterator();
 	    while (li.hasNext()) {
 		processRow(((Integer)li.next()).intValue());
 	    }
 	}
     }
 

Example 6: Grouped boolean checkboxes in a table, using value bindings to maintain the state.

This example is similar to Example 5, but it maintains the state of checkboxes across requests, by specifying a value binding for the selected attribute. A simple way to store the checkbox state is to store the state with the row data.

<ui:checkbox id="cb6" selected="#{table6data.selected}"> </ui:checkbox>

The value binding #{table6data.selected} references a boolean member in the row data for storing and retrieving the checkbox state. Notice also that it is not necessary to group the checkboxes by specifying a value for the name attribute. It is not useful to specify boolean checkboxes in a group, in order to obtain the list of selected checkboxes from the request map. The list will consist of indistinguishable true values; one for each selected checkbox.

HTML Elements and Layout

A checkbox is rendered as at least one HTML <span> element and one <input> element of type checkbox. Each checkbox may consist of the following elements and components:

The id attributes for HTML elements and components are constructed as follows, where cid is the clientId of the component being rendered.

Client Side Javascript Functions

Auto-generated component class. Do NOT modify; all changes will be lost!


Field Summary
 
Fields inherited from class com.sun.rave.web.ui.component.RbCbSelector
IMAGE_FACET, LABEL_FACET
 
Fields inherited from class com.sun.rave.web.ui.component.Selector
valueTypeEvaluator
 
Fields inherited from class javax.faces.component.UIInput
COMPONENT_FAMILY, COMPONENT_TYPE, CONVERSION_MESSAGE_ID, REQUIRED_MESSAGE_ID
 
Constructor Summary
CheckboxBase()
          Construct a new CheckboxBase.
 
Method Summary
 java.lang.String getFamily()
          Return the family for this component.
 int getLabelLevel()
          Sets the style level for the generated label, provided the label attribute has been set.
 void restoreState(javax.faces.context.FacesContext _context, java.lang.Object _state)
          Restore the state of this component.
 java.lang.Object saveState(javax.faces.context.FacesContext _context)
          Save the state of this component.
 void setLabelLevel(int labelLevel)
          Sets the style level for the generated label, provided the label attribute has been set.
 
Methods inherited from class com.sun.rave.web.ui.component.RbCbSelector
addToRequestMap, createImageComponent, createLabelComponent, encodeBegin, getConvertedValue, getConvertedValue, getImageComponent, getLabelComponent, getSelectedValue, isChecked
 
Methods inherited from class com.sun.rave.web.ui.component.RbCbSelectorBase
getImageURL, getName, getSelected, getValueBinding, setImageURL, setName, setSelected, setSelectedValue, setValueBinding
 
Methods inherited from class com.sun.rave.web.ui.component.Selector
compareValues, getRendersChildren, getValueAsReadOnly, isMultiple, setMultiple, toString
 
Methods inherited from class com.sun.rave.web.ui.component.SelectorBase
getItems, getLabel, getOnBlur, getOnChange, getOnClick, getOnDblClick, getOnFocus, getOnKeyDown, getOnKeyPress, getOnKeyUp, getOnMouseDown, getOnMouseMove, getOnMouseOut, getOnMouseOver, getOnMouseUp, getOnSelect, getStyle, getStyleClass, getTabIndex, getToolTip, isDisabled, isReadOnly, isVisible, setDisabled, setItems, setLabel, setOnBlur, setOnChange, setOnClick, setOnDblClick, setOnFocus, setOnKeyDown, setOnKeyPress, setOnKeyUp, setOnMouseDown, setOnMouseMove, setOnMouseOut, setOnMouseOver, setOnMouseUp, setOnSelect, setReadOnly, setStyle, setStyleClass, setTabIndex, setToolTip, setVisible
 
Methods inherited from class javax.faces.component.UIInput
addValidator, addValueChangeListener, broadcast, decode, getSubmittedValue, getValidator, getValidators, getValueChangeListener, getValueChangeListeners, isImmediate, isLocalValueSet, isRequired, isValid, processDecodes, processUpdates, processValidators, removeValidator, removeValueChangeListener, setImmediate, setLocalValueSet, setRequired, setSubmittedValue, setValid, setValidator, setValue, setValueChangeListener, updateModel, validate, validateValue
 
Methods inherited from class javax.faces.component.UIOutput
getConverter, getLocalValue, getValue, setConverter
 
Methods inherited from class javax.faces.component.UIComponentBase
addFacesListener, encodeChildren, encodeEnd, findComponent, getAttributes, getChildCount, getChildren, getClientId, getFacesContext, getFacesListeners, getFacet, getFacets, getFacetsAndChildren, getId, getParent, getRenderer, getRendererType, isRendered, isTransient, processRestoreState, processSaveState, queueEvent, removeFacesListener, restoreAttachedState, saveAttachedState, setId, setParent, setRendered, setRendererType, setTransient
 
Methods inherited from class java.lang.Object
clone, equals, finalize, getClass, hashCode, notify, notifyAll, wait, wait, wait
 
Methods inherited from interface com.sun.rave.web.ui.component.SelectorManager
getClientId, getOnChange, getStyle, getStyleClass, getTabIndex, isDisabled, isReadOnly
 
Methods inherited from interface javax.faces.component.ValueHolder
getConverter, getLocalValue, getValue, setConverter
 

Constructor Detail

CheckboxBase

public CheckboxBase()

Construct a new CheckboxBase.

Method Detail

getFamily

public java.lang.String getFamily()

Return the family for this component.

Overrides:
getFamily in class RbCbSelectorBase

getLabelLevel

public int getLabelLevel()

Sets the style level for the generated label, provided the label attribute has been set. Valid values are 1 (largest), 2 and 3 (smallest). The default value is 3.

Overrides:
getLabelLevel in class Selector

setLabelLevel

public void setLabelLevel(int labelLevel)

Sets the style level for the generated label, provided the label attribute has been set. Valid values are 1 (largest), 2 and 3 (smallest). The default value is 3.

Overrides:
setLabelLevel in class SelectorBase
See Also:
getLabelLevel()

restoreState

public void restoreState(javax.faces.context.FacesContext _context,
                         java.lang.Object _state)

Restore the state of this component.

Specified by:
restoreState in interface javax.faces.component.StateHolder
Overrides:
restoreState in class RbCbSelectorBase

saveState

public java.lang.Object saveState(javax.faces.context.FacesContext _context)

Save the state of this component.

Specified by:
saveState in interface javax.faces.component.StateHolder
Overrides:
saveState in class RbCbSelectorBase