More portlets in portlet-app

[Evert Lammerts <Ev...@sara.nl>]

Hi list,

I'm trying to get a grip on portlet development with struts and it would be great if someone can help me out! I'm using a Tomcat 6 application server icw a Liferay 5.1.2 portal. I've managed to get struts 1.3.8 portlets working through a struts bridge and now I want to start developing. My use case is the following:

I need to generate a list of available applications that run at different locations. The content of this list is based on user attributes, but that is out of the context of this use case. When a link to an application is clicked it should pull up an application specific form containing input fields for all parameters necessary to run the application.

Intuitively I'd say the list of applications is a single portlet, while the form represents a second portlet. There should be a parent class / portlet for the form that can handle submission. The portlet that lists the available applications needs to initialize the portlet that displays the form with specific parameters - it should tell the portlet which form to display.

So, starting to develop, I put two portlets inside a single portlet-app definition in portlet.xml and I started with defining two actions, one to display the list of applications and one to display a sample form. But now I need to find a way to specify which portlet when the portlet-app is started. How would I do that? If you need some more information just let me know. Also, I'd be very interested in suggestions on the design of this use case!

Thanks a bunch!
Evert Lammerts