[OmniFaces Utilities (2.0)] Send a HTTP response error with the given status and message

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[OmniFaces utilities] The responseSendError() method sends a HTTP response error with the given status and message. This will end up in either a custom <error-page> whose <error-code> matches the given status, or in a servlet container specific default error page if there is none. The message will be available in the error page as a request attribute with name javax.servlet.error.message. The FacesContext#responseComplete() will implicitly be called after sending the error. The HTTP response status is supposed to be in the range 4nn-5nn. You can use the constant field values of HttpServletResponse for this.

Note The caller should preferably not catch the IOException thrown by this method,but just re-declare it in the action method.The Servlet container will handle it.

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Method:

See also: Faces#getContext() | Faces#hasContext() | Faces#setContext()

Usage:

Suppose that we access a page as: shop.xhtml?product=id, where id is the unique product identifier (e.g. a number between 1-100). We have this:

<h:head>

  <title></title>       

  <f:metadata>

    <f:viewParam name="product"

                 value="#{productBean.product}"

                 validator="productValidator"/>                      

  </f:metadata>

</h:head>

 Now, this id must be validated before showing the product, and if it is an invalid product then return a 404 page error. For this, we can use the Faces#responseSendError(), as below:

import org.omnifaces.util.Faces;

...

@FacesValidator(value = "productValidator")

public class ProductValidator implements Validator {

  @Override

  public void validate(FacesContext context, UIComponent component, Object value)

                                                       throws ValidatorException {

    int id = Integer.parseInt((String) value);

    if (check_id) {

        try {

            Faces.responseSendError(404, "The product with unique product identifier, " + id + " cannot be found !");

            // or using, HttpServletResponse#SC_NOT_FOUND

            Faces.responseSendError(HttpServletResponse.SC_NOT_FOUND, 
                "The product with unique product identifier, " + id + " cannot be found !");

        } catch (IOException ex) {

          throw new FacesException(ex);

        }

    }

  }

}

How the user sees the error message ? Well, by default it will see it in a Servlet container specific default error page, as below:

Or, you may provide an error page and configure it in web.xml. A simple error.xhtml page:

...

<h:body>     

        <h2>#{facesContext.externalContext.requestMap.get("javax.servlet.error.status_code")}</h2>       

  <hr/>

  Error Desscription: #{facesContext.externalContext.requestMap.get("javax.servlet.error.message")}<br/>               

  Servlet Name: #{facesContext.externalContext.requestMap.get("javax.servlet.error.servlet_name")}

</h:body>

...

In web.xml, it must be configured as:

<error-page>

  <error-code>404</error-code>

  <location>/faces/error.xhtml</location>

</error-page>

Now, the result of an invalid id will be:

API GH