Best way to develop the frontend(GUI) & controller parts of a moderately complex web application developed in Java

Question

What would be a good strategy(framework etc to choose) to develop the frontend(GUI) & controller parts of a moderately complex web application(social portal) developed in Java. What framework if any are recommended. I had heard a lot of good about JSF but recently came to know about lots of its shortcomings .

Answer 1

Well, JSF is not that bad. :) From just skimming over the link you provided, I can see that the basic problem is lack of components. Thus you might want to try component libraries like RichFaces or PrimeFaces.

One problem that we experienced though, was the sometimes limited customizability of the components' look and feel, ie it might get harder if you have strict requirements on layout/look and feel.

Answer 2

Our team has used JSF on two projects so far. It worked well using component libraries such as PrimeFaces and IceFaces for more complex components (AJAX, composite components, etc). We sat through a very boring IceFaces webinar recently discussing the benefits of JSF2. You should look into JSF2.

Answer 3

All frameworks out there have pro's and con's. These are the ones we have used with some success:

• GWT + SmartGWT: Upside, it is Java and the GUI editor is pretty neat. Downside, compilation time is huge.
• Wicket: Upside, it is Java+HTML. Downside, we had to use a lot of javascript to get it to work the way we wanted.
• Struts + YUI: Upside, it is kind of simple for simple things. Downside, things gets ugly fast.
• JSF: It is like the Opera, either you like it or you hate it. I'm in the "hate it" part so anything I said is biased (plus, in our test prototypes developing in Wicket was faster than JSF)