Adam Winer on JSF Usability

Adam Winer writes in his blog, "JSF is not perfect, nor the greatest thing since sliced bread." But why this Java Champion and member of the JCP expert group come down so hard on a framework that he has been a strong advocate for?

What bugs me most (and remember, I'm still a big fan) is that JSF was supposed to be really easy-to-use. But the reality isn't quite so sweet.

In his estimation the real problem lies in the large stack traces that any error in the JSF seems to produce. According to Adam, these stack traces are simply not enough to fetter out the real problem. To do that you need information to connect the error with the source code that produced it and that information has to be more meaningful and concise.

The most annoying problem is that errors simply result in big stack traces. There's nothing wrong with stack traces per se, but by themselves they're totally insufficient for error diagnosis. Real diagnosis requires at a minimum. In addition there is the possibility of silent failures. Errors in configuration or validation halt execution and all you see is nothing. This doesn't even give you a clue as to where to start looking. If and when you do happen to find the problem you’ll most likely need to bounce the webserver to pick up the changes.


That is what Adam has on his hit list of usablity problems and now he is looking to expand it by adding yours. Drop him a note on his blog and let him know what is on your list.


Threaded replies
· Adam Winer on JSF Usability by Kirk Pepperdine on Wed Feb 22 09:05:57 EST 2006
· Adam Winer on JSF Usability by Steve Zara on Wed Feb 22 11:50:07 EST 2006
· Adam Winer on JSF Usability by Adam Winer on Wed Feb 22 12:27:54 EST 2006
· Adam Winer on JSF Usability by Steve Zara on Wed Feb 22 13:20:39 EST 2006
· Adam Winer on JSF Usability by Jacob Hookom on Wed Feb 22 13:39:14 EST 2006
· Adam Winer on JSF Usability by Alexandre Poitras on Wed Feb 22 18:14:48 EST 2006
· Adam Winer on JSF Usability by Adam Winer on Thu Feb 23 00:33:44 EST 2006
· Adam Winer on JSF Usability by Atilio Ranzuglia on Wed Mar 29 06:45:58 EST 2006
· Struts Nexus by Frans Thamura on Wed Feb 22 16:38:32 EST 2006
· Another JSF problem: the rendering order by Francesco Chirico on Mon Mar 13 06:37:44 EST 2006
· Another JSF problem: the rendering order by Jacob Hookom on Mon Mar 13 14:04:42 EST 2006
· Adam Winer on JSF Usability by Paul Furbacher on Tue Feb 28 14:54:20 EST 2006
· Still a long way to go by Oleg Bondarenko on Mon Mar 20 08:33:25 EST 2006
· Also a JSP problem by Bernhard Slominski on Wed Mar 29 02:36:06 EST 2006
· Forget *all* the old stuff, and explain better ? by Remi Vankeisbelck on Wed Mar 29 04:20:45 EST 2006
· Forget *all* the old stuff, and explain better ? by Alexandre Poitras on Wed Mar 29 07:13:05 EST 2006
· Forget *all* the old stuff, and explain better ? by Remi Vankeisbelck on Wed Mar 29 08:31:44 EST 2006
· Forget *all* the old stuff, and explain better ? by Alexandre Poitras on Wed Mar 29 08:53:29 EST 2006
· Forget *all* the old stuff, and explain better ? by Remi Vankeisbelck on Wed Mar 29 09:24:24 EST 2006
· Forget *all* the old stuff, and explain better ? by Alexandre Poitras on Wed Mar 29 10:44:42 EST 2006
· Forget *all* the old stuff, and explain better ? by Remi Vankeisbelck on Wed Mar 29 11:19:20 EST 2006
· Forget *all* the old stuff, and explain better ? by Jacob Hookom on Wed Mar 29 13:48:44 EST 2006
· XUL vs Swing ? Come on... by Remi Vankeisbelck on Wed Mar 29 14:18:01 EST 2006
· XUL vs Swing ? Come on... by Jacob Hookom on Wed Mar 29 15:29:53 EST 2006
· XUL vs Swing ? Come on... by Remi Vankeisbelck on Wed Mar 29 16:52:45 EST 2006
· XUL vs Swing ? Come on... by Alexandre Poitras on Wed Mar 29 20:27:58 EST 2006
· XUL vs Swing ? Come on... by Alexandre Poitras on Wed Mar 29 20:32:45 EST 2006
· Rich Server-Side UIs vs JSF by Remi Vankeisbelck on Thu Mar 30 04:46:21 EST 2006
· They clearly don't like it ! by Remi Vankeisbelck on Thu Mar 30 04:50:04 EST 2006
· They clearly don't like it ! by Alexandre Poitras on Thu Mar 30 06:48:26 EST 2006
· Java-based vs XML-based UI development and other bs... by Remi Vankeisbelck on Thu Mar 30 07:06:17 EST 2006
· Java-based vs XML-based UI development and other bs... by Alexandre Poitras on Thu Mar 30 08:51:07 EST 2006
· Java-based vs XML-based UI development and other bs... by Remi Vankeisbelck on Thu Mar 30 11:03:23 EST 2006
· XML programming nightmare by Remi Vankeisbelck on Thu Mar 30 11:09:20 EST 2006
· RE : XML programming nightmare by Alexandre Poitras on Thu Mar 30 13:24:42 EST 2006
· RE : XML programming nightmare by Alexandre Poitras on Thu Mar 30 13:29:45 EST 2006
· RE : XML programming nightmare by Remi Vankeisbelck on Thu Mar 30 16:35:26 EST 2006
· RE : XML programming nightmare by Remi Vankeisbelck on Thu Mar 30 16:14:22 EST 2006
· RE : XML programming nightmare by Alexandre Poitras on Thu Mar 30 19:36:49 EST 2006
· RE : XML programming nightmare by Steve Zara on Sun Apr 02 07:09:01 EDT 2006
· RE : XML programming nightmare by Alexandre Poitras on Sun Apr 02 10:23:38 EDT 2006
· RE : XML programming nightmare by Remi Vankeisbelck on Sun Apr 02 12:22:14 EDT 2006
· RE : XML programming nightmare by Alexandre Poitras on Sun Apr 02 13:10:21 EDT 2006
· RE : XML programming nightmare by Remi Vankeisbelck on Mon Apr 03 10:49:25 EDT 2006
· RE : XML programming nightmare by Michael Jouravlev on Mon Apr 03 14:46:12 EDT 2006
· RE : XML programming nightmare by Alexandre Poitras on Mon Apr 03 17:23:41 EDT 2006
· RE : XML programming nightmare by Remi Vankeisbelck on Thu Apr 06 16:36:52 EDT 2006
· Masochism... by Remi Vankeisbelck on Sun Apr 02 11:54:48 EDT 2006
· Forget *all* the old stuff, and explain better ? by Michael Jouravlev on Fri Mar 31 13:05:48 EST 2006
· Forget *all* the old stuff, and explain better ? by Alexandre Poitras on Fri Mar 31 14:17:49 EST 2006
· Forget *all* the old stuff, and explain better ? by Remi Vankeisbelck on Fri Mar 31 16:16:42 EST 2006
· Forget *all* the old stuff, and explain better ? by Michael Jouravlev on Fri Mar 31 12:48:12 EST 2006
· Forget *all* the old stuff, and explain better ? by Remi Vankeisbelck on Fri Mar 31 18:01:31 EST 2006
· Hard work yes, but it does work! by Kev Smith on Wed Mar 29 06:22:16 EST 2006
· Hard work yes, but it does work! by Jacob Hookom on Wed Mar 29 10:16:54 EST 2006
· Hard work yes, but it does work! by Kev Smith on Wed Mar 29 11:23:15 EST 2006