final solution preventing validators to kick-in when not required

remember? it was first days, then hours, okay, today hours as well.. but I think with some help of you guys out there blogging also I found the final solution, and the times do get better and better, as I get more and more knowledge about the whole thing.

summary:

• use the PhaseListener to catch the phase: PROCESS_VALIDATIONS
• add some code to the beforePhase event (to disable the validators for all but the required events)
• add some code to the afterPhase event (to enable the validators again)
• add a recursive method which will enable/disable (ie toggle) all available validators
• add event parameters to your buttons where you DO WANT TO trigger the validators

PhaseListener updates:

• add this code in the beforePhase method, it will disable the validators if no event parameters (name=requireValidation, value=true) are present

FacesContext facesContext = event.getFacesContext();
try {
    // handle validators
    if (event.getPhaseId().equals(PhaseId.PROCESS_VALIDATIONS)) {
// add validators if required
// i use:    
//CustomValidator v = new CustomValidator();
//v.handleValidators();

        // if not submitted via save button disable validators
        // get eventHandlerClientId
        String eventHandlerClientId = (String) facesContext
                .getExternalContext().getRequestParameterMap().get(
                        “$$xspsubmitid”);
        // extract eventHandlerId
        String eventHandlerId = eventHandlerClientId.substring(
                eventHandlerClientId.lastIndexOf(“:”) + 1,
                eventHandlerClientId.length());
        // get eventHandler “component”
        UIEventHandler eventHandler = (UIEventHandler) Util
                .findComponent(facesContext.getViewRoot(),
                        eventHandlerId);

        // find the parameters set via Edit Event parameters on the
        // Events page
        boolean skipValidation = true;
        List<Parameter> parameters = eventHandler.getParameters();
        if (null != parameters) {
            Iterator<Parameter> iterator = parameters.iterator();

            while (iterator.hasNext()) {
                Parameter par = iterator.next();
                if (par.getName().equals(“requireValidation”)
                        && par.getValue().equals(“true”)) {
                    skipValidation = false;
                    break;
                }
            }
        }
        if (skipValidation) {
            toggleValidators(facesContext.getViewRoot(), true);
        }

    }
} catch (Exception e) {
    // default disable validations for all other events which are not
    // “requireValidation=true” and which might throw an error while trying to get their event handler
    toggleValidators(facesContext.getViewRoot(), true);
}

• add this code to the afterPhase, it will enable the validators again:

if (event.getPhaseId().equals(PhaseId.PROCESS_VALIDATIONS)) {
    FacesContext facesContext = event.getFacesContext();
    toggleValidators(facesContext.getViewRoot(), false);
}

• add this method, it will recursively find all components where validators might be existing and enables/disables them. This method is most likely candidate for speed improvements: You could use as parent component the actual tab (for tabbed panels) being displayed, but then you would have to track which one is selected, I prefer to just run it on the whole tree to make it simple for now

• add an event parameter to all your buttons where you do want to trigger the validation