How to integrate Struts 2 with Tiles 3 - struts2

Question

How do we integrate Struts 2 with Tiles 3? The struts2-tiles-plugin currently (2.3.4.1) works with an older version of tiles (version 2.0.6) this can be a bit of a nuisance.
This is a self-answer, to help others with their integration.

Answer 1

The solution is to add the required dependencies, load tiles with an appropriate listener and create a custom result type. Fortunately these steps are quite easy, once done you can follow normal tiles 2 examples for a how to define templates.
1) Dependencies (start with basic struts project but in this example I'll use conventions so it might just be best to add struts2-conventions-plugin, it will include struts2-core et al):
DO NOT INCLUDE struts2-tiles-plugin
groupId: org.apache.tiles, artifiactId: tiles-extras, version: 3.0.1
groupId: org.slf4j, artifiactId: jcl-over-slf4j, version: 1.5.8
groupId: org.slf4j, artifiactId: slf4j-jdk14, version: 1.5.8
Note: A higher version of the slf4j dependencies may work I have not tested this.
2) load tiles with an appropriate listener
This example includes the full web.xml, lines 3-5 are the only thing that should be new to someone familiar with struts2.
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<web-app version="2.5" xmlns="http://java.sun.com/xml/ns/javaee" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance" xsi:schemaLocation="http://java.sun.com/xml/ns/javaee http://java.sun.com/xml/ns/javaee/web-app_2_5.xsd">
<listener>
<listener-class>org.apache.tiles.extras.complete.CompleteAutoloadTilesListener</listener-class>
</listener>
<filter>
<filter-name>struts2</filter-name>
<filter-class>org.apache.struts2.dispatcher.ng.filter.StrutsPrepareAndExecuteFilter</filter-class>
</filter>
<filter-mapping>
<filter-name>struts2</filter-name>
<url-pattern>/*</url-pattern>
</filter-mapping>
</web-app>
3) create a custom result type
We need to define a custom result type for use with our actions:
package com.quaternion.result;
import com.opensymphony.xwork2.ActionInvocation;
import javax.servlet.ServletContext;
import javax.servlet.http.HttpServletRequest;
import javax.servlet.http.HttpServletResponse;
import org.apache.struts2.ServletActionContext;
import org.apache.struts2.dispatcher.ServletDispatcherResult;
import org.apache.tiles.TilesContainer;
import org.apache.tiles.access.TilesAccess;
import org.apache.tiles.request.ApplicationContext;
import org.apache.tiles.request.servlet.ServletRequest;
import org.apache.tiles.request.servlet.ServletUtil;
public class TilesResult extends ServletDispatcherResult {
public TilesResult() {
super();
}
public TilesResult(String location) {
super(location);
}
#Override
public void doExecute(String location, ActionInvocation invocation) throws Exception {
//location = "test.definition"; //for test
setLocation(location);
ServletContext context = ServletActionContext.getServletContext();
ApplicationContext applicationContext = ServletUtil.getApplicationContext(context);
TilesContainer container = TilesAccess.getContainer(applicationContext);
HttpServletRequest request = ServletActionContext.getRequest();
HttpServletResponse response = ServletActionContext.getResponse();
ServletRequest servletRequest = new ServletRequest(applicationContext, request, response);
container.render(location, servletRequest);
}
}
4) We also need to tell struts2 about our result type:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE struts PUBLIC
"-//Apache Software Foundation//DTD Struts Configuration 2.0//EN"
"http://struts.apache.org/dtds/struts-2.0.dtd">
<struts>
<constant name="struts.devMode" value="true" />
<constant name="struts.ui.theme" value="simple" />
<package name="tiles-package" namespace="" extends="struts-default">
<result-types>
<result-type default="true" name="tiles-result" class="com.quaternion.result.TilesResult"/>
</result-types>
</package>
</struts>
With that out of the way we can now use tiles in our projects, assume we have created a tiles definition called "test.definition" we can tell our action to use that definition by doing the following:
package com.quaternion.demo.action.test;
import com.opensymphony.xwork2.ActionSupport;
import org.apache.struts2.convention.annotation.ParentPackage;
import org.apache.struts2.convention.annotation.Result;
#ParentPackage("tiles-package")
#Result(type="tiles-result", location="test.definition")
public class QuaternionResultTest extends ActionSupport{}
That's it, this will let you configure any version of struts2 with tiles 3+, please see http://tiles.apache.org/framework/index.html for further configuration details.

Answer 2

Thanks to Ken a new plugin was added to Struts 2 to support Tiles 3 result type, it should be available with upcoming new release - Struts 2.3.9
https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/WW/Tiles+3+Plugin

Answer 3

<!DOCTYPE tiles-definitions PUBLIC "-//Apache Software Foundation//DTD Tiles Configuration 3.0//EN" "http://tiles.apache.org/dtds/tiles-config_3_0.dtd">
use mentioned doctype in your tiles.xml