within 2 releases myfaces extval grew up to a very powerful validation platform which is used in several real-world projects. due to that extval solves real-world problems. the pluggable architecture allows you to implement fancy add-ons to provide functionality which isn't available out-of-the-box and wouldn't be possible with the standard validation mechanism offered by jsf. so the question is: "what's next?"
here is a short preview of some new features of the next release. it's a quite early preview. so i might update this post, if there are some new information.
the "big" parts:
#1 jsr 303 (bean validation) validation module
that's a new validation module for extval which allows the unified usage of jsr 303 with jsf 1.x and jsf 2.x
(jsf 2.x has jsr 303 support out-of-the-box. anyway, this adapter will offer some additional typesafe features)
#2 jsr 314 (javaserver faces 2.0)
there will be a new core version which allows you to use extval with jsf 2.0
so you can continue to use your constraints, add-ons,... with the next version of jsf!
(you will just have to update the modules you are using right now. your implementations remain the same.)
some of the smaller but nice new features:
#3 typesafe constraint aspects (= generic parameters)
such aspects allow you to extend the functionality of existing constraints.
furthermore, they allow to introduce shared features. it's also used as base for the next feature.
#4 none-blocking warn mode
several users asked for a "warn mode". that means: a constraint violation is acceptable for the moment. so the severity of the faces message is switched e.g. to warn. furthermore, it doesn't result in a validator-exception. so the jsf lifecycle continues normally and your actions,... get executed.
the syntax isn't final now - the currently available implementation is e.g.:
@Required(parameters = ViolationSeverity.Warn.class)
the parameters-attribute comes from #3 and isn't aware of the severity aspect.
the parameter concept is key/value based and typesafe (any type is allowed!)
a constraint which supports such generic parameters automatically joins available mechanisms/implementations. that means e.g. add an attribute to your constraint with the type Class< ? extends ValidationParameter >[] -- that's it. without additional implementation you can join such features like the warn-mode.
#5 more out-of-the-box available points for intercepting the validation process
#6 solution for your requirements
extval was started to solve common requirements of users. all parts of the framework are inspired by common real-world requirements. so feel free to ask for new features, add-ons,...
as you see some of the features depend on other releases like the ri implementation of jsr 303. so it's hard to predict the release date.
