The king is dead. Long live the king. Struts 2?

What happens if you take two web frameworks and put them together? In theory, you get a new framework that takes the best of both. The WebWork and Struts developers tried something like that, and the result is Struts 2.

I just finished watching Patrick Lightbody’s presentation WebWork (Struts 2) In Action. Struts 2 clearly relies on the tried-and-tested concept of an action-based, or request-based, framework, sweetened with AJAX, POJOs, Spring integration, OGNL and other popular terms.

I came away from the presentation thinking Struts 2 doesn’t bring anything earth-shattering that hasn’t been around for some time. Still, judging by the features on show, it seems to cover the essentials for a web framework.

• simple configuration
• binding and validation
• integration with business logic
• AJAX support
• an elegant way to write unit and integration tests
• interchangeable rendering technologies