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How Direct Action Requests Are Sent

 Dynamic elements that have an action attribute are bound to component actions. Dynamic elements that have a directActionName attribute are bound to direct actions. The list of dynamic elements bound to direct actions includes WOActiveImage, WOForm, WOFrame, WOHyperlink, WOImageButton, and WOSubmitButton.

When you create a WebObjectsApplication project in release 4.0, a subclass of WODirectAction (a new class in WebObjects 4.0 that is a container for action methods) named "DirectAction" is created for you (along with the WOApplication subclass named "Application" and the WOSession subclass named "Session"). "DirectAction" is the default name for a WODirectAction subclass, and can be renamed if you prefer. You can create several WODirectAction subclasses each performing a single action or a set of actions, or you can have a single WODirectAction subclass perform all of the actions.

For example, the declaration for a WOHyperlink that triggers a direct action might look like this:

myLink: WOHyperlink {
	actionClass = "MyActions";
	directActionName = "logout";
}
The actionClass parameter specifies a subclass of WODirectAction (it defaults to "DirectAction" if omitted). The directActionName should refer to an action name; if omitted, WebObjects invokes the method defaultAction within the specified class. Method names are derived from action names by appending "Action" to the action name; thus, a directActionName of "logout" corresponds to the logoutAction method.

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