Stripes - Introduction

Stripes is a presentation framework for building web applications using the latest Java technologies. The main driver behind Stripes is that web application development in Java is just too much work! It seems like every existing framework requires gobs of configuration. Struts is pretty feature-light and has some serious architectural issues . Others, like WebWork 2 and Spring-MVC are much better, but still require a lot of configuration, and seem to require you to learn a whole new language just to get started.

Goals of Stripes

• Make developing web applications in Java easy
• Provide simple yet powerful solutions to common problems
• Make the Stripes ramp up time for a new developer less than 30 minutes
• Make it really easy to extend Stripes, without making you configure every last thing

Key Features

• Zero external configuration per page/action (ActionBeans are auto-discovered, and configured using annotations)
• Powerful binding engine that will build complex object webs out of the request parameters
• Easy to use (and localized) validation and type conversion system
• Localization system that works even when you use direct JSP->JSP links
• Ability to re-use ActionBeans as view helpers
• Ridiculously easy to use indexed property support
• Built in support for multiple events per form
• Transparent file upload capabilities
• Support for incremental development (e.g. you can build and test your JSP before even thinking about your ActionBean)
• And a lot of built in flexibility that you only have to be aware of when you need to use it