Chapter 4. Basic concepts of the RichFaces Framework

The RichFaces Framework is implemented as a component library that adds AJAX capabilities into existing pages. This means that you do not need to write any JavaScript code or replace existing components with new AJAX widgets. RichFaces enables page-wide AJAX support instead of the traditional component-wide support, so you can define areas of the page that will reflect changes made by AJAX events on the client.

The diagram following shows the process in full:

RichFaces lets you use JSF tags to define sections of a JSF page that you wish to update with the results of an AJAX request. It also provides you with several options for sending AJAX requests to the server. You do not need to write any JavaScript or XMLHTTPRequest objects by hand — everything is done automatically.