Can a jsf managed bean behave like a servlet?

Question

Normally, a servlet has doGet() and doPost() methods. They are utilized to capture the incoming request parameters, which can then be used in any part of the application, if the developer wishes so.

Now, If instead of using a servlet, a developer wishes to use a jsf managed bean, is there a way to get the request parameters in the bean itself ? If so , how can it be done ?

I have seen this POST which shows a way of getting stuff from request in JSF. Can this be used to get a request parameter in managed bean like this :

HttpServletRequest origRequest = (HttpServletRequest)FacesContext.getCurrentInstance().getExternalContext().getRequest();
String myReqQuery1 = origRequest.getParameter("ReqQuery1");

In this case, will the application follow a jsf life cycle or a servlet life cycle or both ?

Answer 1

JSF does not really work like that. The form fields in the view (.jsf or whatever) are mirrored by fields and properties in the bean. They are automatically populated by JSF when the servlet is invoked further up the stack.

This makes the need to read HTTP parameters redundant except when the browser lands on a JSF page from a non-JSF based form. For that something like Spring-MVC can accept the URI being targetted and make a connection to the ManagedBean instance before redirecting the browser to a JSF powered URL.