Hi,
great job!!!!

But why isn't the full source code in archive?

Greets

GOOD JOB!

I think that this is a major achievement.

> Then why not just write own flow controller but bother to use a web flow system?

Why write your own controller that would not have a flowScope, bookmark history, sub-flow capability, clear separation of view from flow if you don't need to? :-)

As someone who champions Composer oriented MVC I feel that it is perfect for encapsulating the logic of a complex desktop e.g. 'home inbox' of my corporate system. Where ZK Web Flow is creating new capability is in being able to very quickly write "web wizards" to implement data capture that model the user activity of the system. The 'home inbox' of my corporate system will probably remain a complex, bespoke Initiator or Composer based complied controller. If I can quickly add a new variation of the "user wants to add new X to system" use case with a webflow controller that is isolated in a new /WEB-INF/flow/x_v2.xml then why would I choose to hand-code it? The very fact that I can choose where to transition to based on flowScope means that the wizard can skip pages based on user answers to questions, and can show/hide or make mandatory fields based on previous answers held in the flowScope. It seems like it would be tiresome to had write and maintain such logic by hand coding it over time if I can put it into ZK Web Flow where it will be easy for other members of my team to quickly fine and understand its data capture flow.

Well done.

I notice that the download has a version name of "1.0.0-RC" but the pom in the file names it as "1.0.0" which is what it becomes when I upload it into our local Artifactory maven server. To fix that I am editing the pom.xml to make it 1.0.0-RC1. Is the code actually an RC or a first release? thx

If I have a simple flow:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<flow id="main">
<view-state id="viewUsers">
<attribute name="onEntry">
stateScope.put("policies", policyService.getPolicies(null));
</attribute>
<transition id="select" to="finish"/>
</view-state>

<end-state id="finish" />
</flow>

and a simple flow view:

<?page title="Users" contentType="text/html;charset=UTF-8"?>
<?init class="org.zkoss.zwf.FlowHandler" arg0="/WEB-INF/zwf/users.xml"?>
<?variable-resolver class="org.zkoss.zkplus.spring.DelegatingVariableResolver" ?>
<zk xmlns="http://www.zkoss.org/2005/zul">
	<div id="working" self="@{view(content)}" /> 
</zk>

with the view state that simply tries to render the collection in the stateScope:

<zk>
	<listbox sclass="mzk-listbox" model="${stateScope.policies}">
		<listhead sizable="true">
			<listheader label="Creation Date" sort="auto" />
			<listheader label="Policy" />
		</listhead>
		<listitem self="@{each=policy}">
			<listcell label="@{policy.creationDate}" />
			<listcell label="@{policy.reference}" />
		</listitem>
	</listbox>
</zk>

then I get a class cast exception

SEVERE: >>java.lang.ClassCastException: class java.util.ArrayList cannot be converted to interface org.zkoss.zul.GroupsModel.
>>java.lang.InstantiationException: org.zkoss.zul.GroupsModel
>>	at java.lang.Class.newInstance0(Class.java:340)
>>	at java.lang.Class.newInstance(Class.java:308)
>>	at org.zkoss.lang.Classes.coerce(Classes.java:1285)
>>	at org.zkoss.zk.ui.metainfo.Property.assign0(Property.java:250)
>>	at org.zkoss.zk.ui.metainfo.Property.assign(Property.java:175)
>>	at org.zkoss.zk.ui.metainfo.ComponentInfo.applyProperties(ComponentInfo.java:769)
>>	at org.zkoss.zk.ui.impl.AbstractUiFactory.newComponent(AbstractUiFactory.java:95)
>>	at org.zkoss.zk.ui.impl.UiEngineImpl.execCreateChild0(UiEngineImpl.java:616)
>>...

Any ideas?

I can see that I left off the AnnotateDataBinderInit on that last posting. I am still having a problems with data binding. Here is the flow:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<flow id="main">
	<view-state id="viewUsers">
		<attribute name="onEntry">
			stateScope.put("users", rhaHibernateTemplate.loadAll(com.x.y.rha.User.class) ); 
		</attribute>
		<transition id="add" to="addUser"/>
	</view-state>
	
	<view-state id="addUser">
		<attribute name="onEntry">
			stateScope.put("user", new com.x.rha.ui.UserBuilder() ); 
		</attribute>
		<transition id="cancel" to="finish"/>
		<transition id="save" to="viewUsers">
			<attribute name="onTransit">
				java.lang.System.out.println(stateScope.get("user"));	
			</attribute>
		</transition>
	</view-state>
	
	<end-state id="finish" />
</flow>

the main page that includes the flow states is:

<?page title="Users" contentType="text/html;charset=UTF-8"?>
<?init class="org.zkoss.zwf.FlowHandler" arg0="/WEB-INF/zwf/users.xml"?>
<?init class="org.zkoss.zkplus.databind.AnnotateDataBinderInit" ?>
<?variable-resolver class="org.zkoss.zkplus.spring.DelegatingVariableResolver" ?>
<zk xmlns="http://www.zkoss.org/2005/zul">
	<div id="working" self="@{view(content)}" /> 
</zk>

where this time I have the AnnotateDataBinderInit :-) ignoring the viewUsers.zul which works as per my last post I am trying to get the addUser.zul working using annotations:

<zk>
	<grid>
		<rows>
			<row>
				<label value="ID"  sclass="firstColumn"/>
				<textbox value="@{user.id}"  />
			</row>
			<row>
				<label value="First Name"  sclass="firstColumn"/>
				<textbox value="@{user.firstName}"  />
			</row>
			<row>
				<label value="Second Name"  sclass="firstColumn"/>
				<textbox value="@{user.secondName}"  />
			</row>
			<row>
				<label value="Text Input"  sclass="firstColumn"/>
				<textbox value="${user}"  />
			</row>
			
		</rows>
	</grid>
	<button label="Save" mold="os" sclass="mzkprimary mzkbold" self="@{action(save)}"/>
</zk>

My problem is that the ${user} is working find but the @{user} annotations don't seem to be happy at all. The System.out.println() in the flow shows null for all of the databound elements. Typically that happens when I my annotations are not binding to anything. How can I expose the ${user} set in the flow scope to the databinder or is that not supported yet?

Q1. java.lang.ClassCastException: class java.util.ArrayList cannot be converted to interface org.zkoss.zul.GroupsModel.

<listbox sclass="mzk-listbox" model="${stateScope.policies}">

The ${stateScope.policies} EL eval to an ArrayList and ZK engine try to assign it into listbox's model and throw the
exception. Have to prepare the policies to be a ListModel first. (In @{}, the data binder will do the type
conversion from ArrayList to ListModel for you automatically)

Q2. The issue regarding the AnnotateDataBinderInit.

Current version of DataBinder is not able to handle "dynamically changed" view. That is, the data binder in a zul file
cannot "manage" those components "added afterward".

A proper way (aka workaround) in such case is to prepare a new data binder for each new added page (instead prepare
one in the main layout page). That data binder will handle only that specific "tree of components". It would be something
looks like following in your viewUser.zul:

<?init class="org.zkoss.zkplus.databind.AnnotateDataBinderInit" arg0="./mygrid"?>
<zk>
<grid id="mygrid">
<rows>
<row>
<label value="ID" sclass="firstColumn"/>
<textbox value="@{user.id}" />
</row>
...
</grid>
<button label="Save" mold="os" sclass="mzkprimary mzkbold" self="@{action(save)}"/>
</zk>

Note the arg0="./mygrid" in AnnotateDataBinderInit, it tells the data binder to take care the tree of components rooted
with the grid "mygrid".

Q3. ... expected place to put logic to make a branch decision on the flow...

In the flow, there is an <action-state test="..."/> to do the "switch.. case" type of branch. However, if come to the disable/enable of
a button in "view", I have no better idea than something like data binding disabled="@{mygrid$composer.disabled}". Do you have
other suggestions?

I meant the FlowHandler class?
class="org.zkoss.zwf.FlowHandler?????????

Hi,

this library looks very promising. It might be usefull if you can provide us with source code of the library.

What is the recommanded solution to put more logic into transition / validation / variable setup? Even in your simple example, there is quite a lot of java code in the XML definition file. I would like to have some clear place where to put java code and make reference from XML (like composer and ZUL files vs. zscript).

Thanks,

Edudant