Useful to use Struts 2 already?

[Tim Storms]

Hi ranchers,

I'm starting on a new Java web project. Do you think it's useful to already use the new Struts2 instead of Struts 1.x for the project?

Does anyone know a good tutorial/manual for struts 2? I'm already using this one: http://cwiki.apache.org/WW/home.html.

[Alan Hermin]

Struts2 is usefull,,but you will face many problems because you will not find many materials and resources on the net.so go to Struts1.x,
regards

[Purushoth Thambu]

I haven't yet checked the Struts 2.0 release. It will be good if some one shares what to be expect from release 2.0 and sort of links where Struts and JSF is compared. I believe JSF will take over at some point of time.

[Brent Sterling]

That depends. Do you work for a company with a team of experienced Struts developers? Do you need to release this project in the next 6 months? Is this a standard form based web application? If your answers are Yes than Struts 1.3 seems like a good choice.

In general the area of web frameworks is wide open right now. Back in 2002, Struts was about the only thing going and it sure beat JSP/Servlet solutions (which beat Servlet only solutions). These days there lots of options...almost too many.

- Brent

[Manuel Jordan]

Hello guys

in this link
http://cwiki.apache.org/WW/home.html

it obvious a change of syntaxis, why???
why not keep the old standrd???

regards

[Tim Storms]

Brent,

I'm the only developer involved in this project. It's crazy, I know... :-)
We estimated this project would take about 8 months. What I have to do is to create an intranet page that takes care of all user account requests in a sox compliant way. This project will involve quite a bit of database transactions (which I intend to use Hibernate for).

I'd like to use Struts 2 for this project, but the lack of good documentation is indeed a huge problem. Are there any books planned on Struts 2 already? Or should I just stick with Struts 1.3?

Thanks for your advices!

[Brent Sterling]

I have not been keeping up with Struts 2.0. My initial understanding was that it was just going to be WebWork 2.2 renamed to Struts 2.0. My guess is that since it has not been released yet is that the team is working to get better integration with Struts 1.x in place...or at least a migration path from Struts 1.x to Struts 2.0.

So at this point, I have to wonder how much different Struts 2.0 will be from WebWork 2.2. If they are very similar then any materials on WebWork should apply. When I was doing some research into WebWork I found that it had changed a lot in the last few versions and that much of the documentation in place did not apply to version 2.2.

The only book that I see published is "WebWork in Action" (Sept 2005). I don't know what version of WebWork that covers. At a conference back in April, Matthew Porter said that he had completed a book titled something like "WebWork 2.2 Live" but that they were holding it up for the Struts merger and it was going to be titled "Struts 2.0 Live". I could not find any info on this book.

At this point I am wondering if it is too early to apply the term "debacle" to the Struts - WebWork merger. Outside of the Struts development team I don't think very many people have a clue about what is going on or what to expect from Struts 2.0.

- Brent

[Merrill Higginson]

Brent,

Struts 2.0 is only a few days old, but it has finally been released.

[Tim Storms]

Originally posted by Merrill Higginson:
Brent,

Struts 2.0 is only a few days old, but it has finally been released.

If I'm not mistaken, Struts 2.0 is still in a beta fase? Man, I really think the Struts guys should give more information on the new Struts. As Brent, I'm a bit confused about the 2.0 version...

Anyway, maybe I should give Spring a try... ;-)

[Cameron Wallace McKenzie]

Personally, I would go with Struts 2. The fundamentals are the same, and the improvements will be helpful.

For a tutorial on Struts basics, which area applicable to Struts 2, check this out:

Free Multimedia Tutorials on Struts, J2EE and Servlet/JSP Development

Cheers!

-Cameron McKenzie

[Tim Storms]

Originally posted by Cameron W. McKenzie:
Personally, I would go with Struts 2. The fundamentals are the same, and the improvements will be helpful.

For a tutorial on Struts basics, which area applicable to Struts 2, check this out:

Free Multimedia Tutorials on Struts, J2EE and Servlet/JSP Development

Cheers!

-Cameron McKenzie

Thanks for that Cameron. I've already done a couple of projects with Struts 1.x. I'm especially interested in some good Struts 2.0 documentation/tutorials/(to be released) books. Do you know something about that?

[Brent Sterling]

Talking with some people around the shop they pointed out that one of the major complaints about the WebWork project was the lack of documentation. I had never heard of WebWork until the merger was announced. In my research I found the lack of documentation to be an issue. It seems like WebWork has been changing pretty fast and that documentation that was a few years old was pretty obsolete. I suspect that this will change soon, but currently it is an issue.

I don't think there are any major risks involved with picking WebWork 2.2 for a new project. My impression is that it is a production ready, fully capable framework. The learning curve for a Struts developer is minimal because they are similar. But there IS a learning curve and you cannot reuse existing code from Struts projects.

- Brent

[Jeevan Philip]

I recommend going ahead with the development using Webwork 2.x. This will help you later if you want to migrate to Struts 2.x as it is based on WW code.

[Brent Sterling]

Tim:

If you are still following this thread...did you make a choice? If you went with WebWork or Struts 2.0 I would be interested in hearing your feedback.

- Brent