Installation instructions

The Struts-Layout distribution contains a rewritten and fully packaged (war file) version of the struts example application. It can be plugged into a servlet container as the original one.

To start a new web projet with Struts-Layout, the following steps must be followed:

Configure Struts

Configure Struts for your webapp. Please refer to the Struts documentation.

Configure Struts-Layout actions

Struts-Layout requires special treeview and sort action in your struts-config.xml. The Struts-Layout plugin can configure them automatically , or you can configure them manually.

Auto configuration by the plugin:

<plug-in className="fr.improve.struts.taglib.layout.workflow.LayoutPlugin"/>

Manual configuration of the actions:

<action path="/sort"
	type="fr.improve.struts.taglib.layout.sort.SortAction"
	scope="request"
	validate="false">
</action>
    
<action path="/treeview"
	type="fr.improve.struts.taglib.layout.treeview.TreeviewAction"
	scope="request"
	validate="false">
</action>

If forward to Tiles definition are to be used with sorting or paging on the server, the Struts-Layout request processor must be used and declared in struts-config.xml : 

<controller processorClass = "fr.improve.struts.taglib.layout.workflow.LayoutRequestProcessor"/>
the Tiles definitions must also have a dot in their names.

Configure Struts-Layout directories

Configure Struts-Layout directories for your webapp. Create a file named "Struts-Layout_default.properties" in WEB-INF/classes. 

directory.config = config
directory.images = images

Copy the static resources

Copy the the "config" and "images" directory from the "resources" folder of the Struts-Layout archive to your webapp root folder

Copy the Struts-Layout jar

Copy the struts-layout.jar file into the WEB-INF/lib directory. This file is located into the "src/library" of the Struts-Layout distribution archive.

What to do next ?

Your application is now ready to use Struts-Layout. You can start writing your JSPs or customize the look and feel of the application.

Compatibility

  • Struts-Layout 1.0 works with Struts 1.0 and 1.1. However, note that due to an inheritage change between Struts 1.0 and Struts 1.1, Struts-Layout must be recompiled to work with struts 1.0.
  • Struts-Layout 1.1 works with Struts 1.1 and 1.2.
  • Struts-Layout 1.2, 1.3 and 1.4 works with Struts 1.2 and 1.3. It can also work with Struts 1.1 if you use the special compatibility jar.