16.10 Registering a Custom Renderer with a Render Kit

When the application developer creates a custom renderer, as described in Delegating Rendering to a Renderer, you must register it using the appropriate render kit. Because the image map application implements an HTML image map, the AreaRenderer and MapRenderer classes in the Duke's Bookstore case study should be registered using the HTML render kit.

You register the renderer either by using the @FacesRenderer annotation, as described in Creating the Renderer Class, or by using the render-kit element of the application configuration resource file. Here is a hypothetical configuration of AreaRenderer:

<render-kit>
    <renderer>
        <component-family>Area</component-family>
        <renderer-type>DemoArea</renderer-type>
        <renderer-class>
            dukesbookstore.renderers.AreaRenderer
        </renderer-class>
        <attribute>
            <attribute-name>onmouseout</attribute-name>
            <attribute-class>java.lang.String</attribute-class>
        </attribute>
        <attribute>
            <attribute-name>onmouseover</attribute-name>
            <attribute-class>java.lang.String</attribute-class>
        </attribute>
        <attribute>
            <attribute-name>styleClass</attribute-name>
            <attribute-class>java.lang.String</attribute-class>
        </attribute>
    </renderer>
    ...

Attributes specified in a renderer tag override any settings in the @FacesRenderer annotation.

The render-kit element represents a javax.faces.render.RenderKit implementation. If no render-kit-id is specified, the default HTML render kit is assumed. The renderer element represents a javax.faces.render.Renderer implementation. By nesting the renderer element inside the render-kit element, you are registering the renderer with the RenderKit implementation associated with the render-kit element.

The renderer-class is the fully qualified class name of the Renderer.

The component-family and renderer-type elements are used by a component to find renderers that can render it. The component-family identifier must match that returned by the component class's getFamily method. The component family represents a component or set of components that a particular renderer can render. The renderer-type must match that returned by the getRendererType method of the tag handler class.

By using the component family and renderer type to look up renderers for components, the JavaServer Faces implementation allows a component to be rendered by multiple renderers and allows a renderer to render multiple components.

Each of the attribute tags specifies a render-dependent attribute and its type. The attribute element doesn't affect the runtime execution of your application. Rather, it provides information to tools about the attributes the Renderer supports.

The object responsible for rendering a component (be it the component itself or a renderer to which the component delegates the rendering) can use facets to aid in the rendering process. These facets allow the custom component developer to control some aspects of rendering the component. Consider this custom component tag example:

<d:dataScroller>
    <f:facet name="header">
        <h:panelGroup>
            <h:outputText value="Account Id"/>
            <h:outputText value="Customer Name"/>
            <h:outputText value="Total Sales"/>
        </h:panelGroup>
    </f:facet>
    <f:facet name="next">
        <h:panelGroup>
            <h:outputText value="Next"/>
            <h:graphicImage url="/images/arrow-right.gif" />
        </h:panelGroup>
    </f:facet>
    ...
</d:dataScroller>

The dataScroller component tag includes a component that will render the header and a component that will render the Next button. If the renderer associated with this component renders the facets, you can include the following facet elements in the renderer element:

<facet>
    <description>This facet renders as the header of the table. It should be
         a panelGroup with the same number of columns as the data.
    </description>
    <display-name>header</display-name>
    <facet-name>header</facet-name>
</facet>
<facet>
    <description>This facet renders as the content of the "next" button in
         the scroller. It should be a panelGroup that includes an outputText
         tag that has the text "Next" and a right arrow icon.
    </description>
    <display-name>Next</display-name>
    <facet-name>next</facet-name>
</facet>

If a component that supports facets provides its own rendering and you want to include facet elements in the application configuration resource file, you need to put them in the component's configuration rather than the renderer's configuration.