ICEFaces installation for NetBeans IDE

ICEFaces is a Java Server Faces component library. To integrate ICEFaces into the NetBeans IDE and the Visual Web Pack the following steps are necessary.

Download of ICEFaces components

The following downloads from the ICEFaces website are needed:

  • ICEfaces-<version>-libs-NetBeans.zip
  • ICEfaces-NetBeans-IDE-<version>.zip
  • ICEfaces-<version>-complib-NetBeans.zip

Installation of ICEFaces runtime library

Unpack the file ICEfaces-<version>-libs-NetBeans.zip and import the included com-icesoft-ide-netbeans-libs-module.nbm module with the NetBeans Update Manager.

Installation of ICEFaces IDE integration

Unpack the file ICEfaces-NetBeans-IDE-<version>.zip and install the module com-icesoft-faces-vwp-ide.nbm. This module must also be installed with the NetBeans Update Manager.

Installation of ICEFaces component library

Unpack file icefaces-webui.complib from ICEfaces-<version>-complib-NetBeans.zip and copy it to your <netbeans-install-dir>/rave2.0/samples folder.

Import the component library with the Component Library Manager under «Tools->Component Library Manager» into your IDE.

Use of ICEFaces components in a Visual Web Pack project

To use the ICEFaces components in a Visual Web Pack application you must add the ICEFaces Component Suite to your project.

Using Jasper Reports with Visual Web Pack

This tutorial illustrates the use of Jasper Reports with a Visual Web Pack application.

Register Jasper Reports library

Use the NetBeans Library Manager to create a library for the Jasper Reports class libraries. You need at least the following files from the distribution:

  • dist/jasperreports-<version>.jar
  • lib/commons-beanutils-1.7.jar
  • lib/commons-collections-2.1.jar
  • lib/commons-digester-1.7.jar
  • lib/commons-logging-1.0.2.jar
  • lib/itext-1.3.1.jar

Register Jasper Reports image servlet

The image servlet is needed if you want html rendered reports (also without any graphical elements, because report placeholders uses images from this servlet). So you must register it in the web.xml configuration file. You can use the NetBeans web.xml editor to do so.

Servlet name  : ImageServlet
Servlet class : net.sf.jasperreports.j2ee.servlets.ImageServlet
URL           : /image

Insert methods for report output to application bean

The following methods in the application bean can be used to output a precompiled report as html or pdf. In this sample a collection of java objects is used as data source. For other data sources see the Jasper Reports documentation.

/**
 * Output Jasper Report
 *
 * @param filename Precompiled report filename
 * @param type Content type of report ("application/pdf" or "text/html")
 * @param data Collection of value objects
 */
public void jasperReport( String filename, String type, Collection data ) {
  jasperReport( filename, type, data, new HashMap() );
}

/**
 * Output Jasper Report
 *
 * @param filename Precompiled report filename
 * @param type Type of report ("application/pdf" or "text/html")
 * @param data Collection of value objects
 * @param params Map with parameters
 */
public void jasperReport( String filename, String type, Collection data, Map params ) {
  final String[] VALID_TYPES = { "text/html", "application/pdf" };
  // First check if type is supported
  boolean found = false;
  for ( int i = 0; i < VALID_TYPES.length; i++ ) {
    if ( VALID_TYPES[i].equals( type ) ) {
      found = true;
      break;
    }
  }

  if ( !found ) {
    throw new IllegalArgumentException( "Report type '" + type + "' not supported." );
  }

  // InputStream for compiled report
  ExternalContext econtext = getExternalContext();
  InputStream stream = econtext.getResourceAsStream( filename );

  if ( stream == null ) {
    throw new IllegalArgumentException( "Report '" + filename + "' could not be opened." );
  }

  // Use collection as data source
  JRBeanCollectionDataSource ds = new JRBeanCollectionDataSource( data );
  JasperPrint jasperPrint = null;

  try {
    jasperPrint = JasperFillManager.fillReport( stream, params, ds );
  } catch ( RuntimeException e ) {
    throw e;
  } catch ( Exception e ) {
    throw new FacesException( e );
  } finally {
    try {
      stream.close();
    } catch ( IOException e ) {
    }
  }

  // Configure exporter and set parameters
  JRExporter exporter = null;
  HttpServletResponse response = (HttpServletResponse) econtext.getResponse();
  FacesContext fcontext = FacesContext.getCurrentInstance();

  try {
    response.setContentType( type );

    if ( "application/pdf".equals( type ) ) {
      exporter = new JRPdfExporter();
      exporter.setParameter( JRExporterParameter.JASPER_PRINT, jasperPrint );
      exporter.setParameter( JRExporterParameter.OUTPUT_STREAM,
        response.getOutputStream() );
    } else if ( "text/html".equals( type ) ) {
      exporter = new JRHtmlExporter();
      exporter.setParameter( JRExporterParameter.JASPER_PRINT, jasperPrint );
      exporter.setParameter( JRExporterParameter.OUTPUT_WRITER, response.getWriter() );
      HttpServletRequest request = (HttpServletRequest)
        fcontext.getExternalContext().getRequest();
      request.getSession().setAttribute(
        ImageServlet.DEFAULT_JASPER_PRINT_SESSION_ATTRIBUTE, jasperPrint );
      exporter.setParameter( JRHtmlExporterParameter.IMAGES_MAP, new HashMap() );
      exporter.setParameter(
        JRHtmlExporterParameter.IMAGES_URI,
        request.getContextPath() + "/image?image=" );
    }
  } catch ( RuntimeException e ) {
    throw e;
  } catch ( Exception e ) {
    throw new FacesException( e );
  }

  // Export report
  try {
    exporter.exportReport();
  } catch ( RuntimeException e ) {
    throw e;
  } catch ( Exception e ) {
    throw new FacesException( e );
  }

  // Tell JavaServer faces that no more processing is necessary
  fcontext.responseComplete();
}

Start report output from page bean

The output of a report can initiated from a ActionEvent with the following code:

try {
  getApplicationBean().jasperReport(
    "/reports/report.jasper",
    "application/pdf",
    getSessionBean().getSuchergebnisDataProvider().getList() );
} catch ( Exception e ) {
  Logger.getLogger(getClass().getName()).severe( e.getMessage() );
}

return null;

NetBeans CVS access with SSH

If your ssh key is secured with a password you need to run a ssh agent (e.g. PuTTY agent) on your client machine, because NetBeans has no support for ssh passwords.

Enter your CVS_ROOT in the following syntax:

:ext:<user>@<host>:<path-to-cvsroot>

You must use external shell command to execute ssh, e.g. for Putty under windows environment:

C:\Program files\Putty\plink.exe -ssh -i <path-to-ssh-keyfile>

Center VWP components

There isn’t any standard function in the Visual Web Pack to center components on the page. You can only use absolute or flow layout.

If you want center your components horizontally or vertically, you need CSS. This is done with the style setting of your component.

position: absolute;
left: 50%;
top: 50%;

This setting would center the left upper corner of your component on the page, but not the whole component. To center the whole component you must adjust the margins. The margins can be negative, so substract the half of the vertical and horizontal size from the corresponding margin. In this sample assume that the component has a height of 100 pixels and a width of 200 pixels.

position: absolute;
left: 50%;
top: 50%;
margin-top: -50px;
margin-left: -100px;