Exadel, Inc. has released Ajax4jsf 1.0, an open source project to combine Ajax and JavaServer Faces (JSF). Created to bring user interface functionality to JSF, Ajax4jsf is a component framework that extends features of JSF to Ajax development. Ajax4jsf 1.0 allows developers to add Ajax capability, including to existing JSF applications. Features include:

• Ajax support within JSF for asynchronous communication and partial page updates
• Compatibility with JSF utilizing all JSF features during the Ajax request/response lifecycle including event listeners, validation, transformation, and messages
• Capability to make existing JSF components Ajax-enabled with no changes to the components themselves
• Zero-JavaScript Ajax: Ajax features without JavaScript coding
• Open architecture and support for industry standards allowing mixing and matching of components from different libraries within an application (including on the same page).

In the near future, additions will include:

• Full compatibility on an API level with the upcoming JSF Extensions Project
• A Component Development Kit to simplify and automate creating custom rich components with built-in AJAX support
• A Component Testing Framework to simplify components development
• A Component Integration Framework to leverage the capabilities of widget-based technologies, like Google Web Toolkit and Macromedia Flash, in a JSF environment

What do you think of Ajax4jsf and the combination of Ajax and JSF?

I really appreciate the API and the way a4j is implemented. The strainght of this product is that it's not intrusive at all. I could use it in my application adding only 2 o 3 lines of code inside it, and still having the possibility to use my JSF custom components. Go ahead !

Really very promising and not intrusive. I had problems in integrating it in my Web Application using Oracle ADF Faces (now Trinidad), but it is said that they are working to make it compliant. Hope it will be soon. Matteo

I use ajax4jsf probably for a couple of months now. It's easy to use, you indeed do not need to write javascript code to have ajax functionality in your regular JSF components and it works with Facelets. I also like the high responsiveness of the developers and the support you get from them.

Problem Integrating ajax4jsf FRAMEWORK with my current JSFapplication. When I copied the ajax4jsf.jar file into my WEB-INF/lib directory, I am getting the below exception. Can't parse configuration file:wsjar:file:/C:/workspaces/PHSRPT/PHSRPTWeb/WebContent/WEB-INF/lib/ajax4jsf.jar!/META-INF/faces-config.xml Can YOU please let me know, how to proceed further? Please let me know any forum or community or anything where in I can find help for AJAX2JSF framework. Looking forward to here from you.... Thanks, Vasu.

I only learned about ajax4jsf a couple of weeks ago, but I am already a big fan. It is easy to use, and it fits perfectly with existing standard or custom JSF components. And if that wasn't enough, it is aware of the JSF lifecycle. I am using ajax4jsf with Facelets, JSF 1.2 reference implementation and some MyFaces components and it works great. I only wish that the ajax4jsf was advertised more heavily, so that more developers could benefit from it. What a great package!