is struts2 Framework dead? if so, which direction to go from here?

Question

I've been working in struts2 framework for the past year and a half. As I look around SO it seems like struts2 questions get the least amount of hits. At first I thought it was because the SO community is not much into struts2, but this is the case in other forums as well. Only the struts2 mailing list is pretty active.

I think struts2 is slowly becoming a dinosaur framework and I want to move on. I've dabbled a little with other stuff like RoR, Grails, Django, .NET MVC but I've never really committed and made a pact with myself to sit down and learn these. Maybe its the fact that I dont know the languages that these frameworks are built on. Spending a day or two with RoR makes me want to choke some of the JAR files and struts2 html tags and .NET MVC looks promising but not knowing c# ties me back.

My question is, have you been on the same path? Did anyone used to do struts2 before and now changed to something new? What would you suggest I learn after Struts2? And lastly, as a developer how do you motivate yourself to learn a new framework, or a language? for me, just typing the code provided in the book is dead boring.

Answer 1

Struts 2 isn't dead. You may want to check out Spring MVC though.

Answer 2

I was a big fan of Struts but somehow I ended up skipping Struts 2 and going straight to Spring Web MVC. But I've recently started to adopt Spring Web Flow and that has been the greatest leap forward for me developing interactive web applications. You still need to know Spring Web MVC since that is what Spring Web Flow is built on.

Answer 3

I don't think Struts2 is dead, I just think that many people are starting to ride the Spring bandwagon. Struts2 is a fine framework with many improvements over the original version of Struts. I just think the project leaders made a mistake by naming it Struts2 as it is conceptually different than the original Struts and began as a different project.

Answer 4

Give GRAILS more time to grow on you. The fact that you can still mix Java code with your Groovy provides a gradual learning curve.

Answer 5

Not dead. In fact, Struts 2 is so different (better) than Struts Classic, it should not even have taken on the name Struts 2. If you have not explored it, I would advise you to have a look.

Peace, Scott

Answer 6

It seems that big organisations are moving towards JSF. I don't like it particularly but it makes sense from the following management selling points all based on JSF being a standard:

• it is a standard for components - reuse possibilities
• the level of abstraction is higher (which I personally don't like....)
• tool support (GUI WYSIWYG editors incorporating arbitrary components etc)
• its complexity ensures that every need is catered for
• it integrates more nicely with the portlet API

Among the other competitors I think Struts 2 is a rather good and solid choice. If in doubt I would look at Wicket, GWT and Grails in the Java world and Rails (Ruby) and Django (Python) elsewhere.

Answer 7

Not dead. Still, I can always recommend Seam as the very best of modern frameworks. Significantly different from all the others, and significantly better than all the others.

Answer 8

Stripes is the Best MVC option.

Answer 9

i agree that struts 2 is a big improvement over earlier struts. However one thing i have noticed is that compared to other frameworks, there seem to be less and less support for struts 2 plugins in IDE's. Currently the only IDE i could find that properly supports struts 2 development is IntelliJ which is a commercial IDE. Both Netbeans and Eclipse lack good struts 2 development support specially compared to RoR, Grails, Spring MVC etc.

IMHO this makes a big difference in terms of adoption and eventually how successful it becomes. I'm using struts 2 in one of my projects and the only IDE where i can get automatic verification, autocompletion etc and all other IDE goodies for Struts 2 is in IntelliJ.

I've searched high and low for plugins for Netbeans and Eclipse but none of them are really robust enough.

Answer 10

WE are using Struts2 in our all projects and it is a good choice all it depends upon your business requirements and which framework we prefrer. Personally i love this framework a very good design. One thing i must say here please do not compare this with Struts1 as both are entirly different framework in terms of design and princliples..