Introduction to Oracle ADF
- by Arda Eralp
The Oracle Application Development Framework (Oracle ADF) is an end-to-end application framework that builds on Java Platform, Enterprise Edition (Java EE) standards and open-source technologies. You can use Oracle ADF to implement enterprise solutions that search, display, create, modify, and validate data using web, wireless, desktop, or web services interfaces. Because of its declarative nature, Oracle ADF simplifies and accelerates development by allowing users to focus on the logic of application creation rather than coding details. Used in tandem, Oracle JDeveloper 11g and Oracle ADF give you an environment that covers the full development lifecycle from design to deployment, with drag-and-drop data binding, visual UI design, and team development features built in.
In line with community best practices, applications you build using the Fusion web technology stack achieve a clean separation of business logic, page navigation, and user interface by adhering to a model-view-controller architecture. MVC architecture:
The model layer represents the data values related to the current page
The view layer contains the UI pages used to view or modify that data
The controller layer processes user input and determines page navigation
The business service layer handles data access and encapsulates business logic
Each ADF module fits in the Fusion web application architecture. The core module in the framework is ADF Model, a data binding facility. The ADF Model layer enables a unified approach to bind any user interface to any business service, without the need to write code. The other modules that make up a Fusion web application technology stack are:
ADF Business Components, which simplifies building business services.
ADF Faces rich client, which offers a rich library of AJAX-enabled UI components for web applications built with JavaServer Faces (JSF).
ADF Controller, which integrates JSF with ADF Model. The ADF Controller extends the standard JSF controller by providing additional functionality, such as reusable task flows that pass control not only between JSF pages, but also between other activities, for instance method calls or other task flows.
