Calling a method in the backing bean when rendering a table

Question

I'm rendering a table that begins with :
<h:dataTable value="#{showRooms.rooms}" var="rowRoom" ...
There are several properties I'm displaying. Some are just displayed as they appear from the database like:
<h:outputText value="#{rowRoom.roomNumber}"/>
However, some I need to translate so they display a more meaningful message to the users. For example, status is stored 'A', or 'NA', but this should display 'Available' or 'Not Available'. To do this, I'm taking an idea I saw in another forum by providing a method to call and translate the text. For example:
public String getDisplayedStatus(String status) {
if (status.equals("A") {
return "Available";
} else {
My problem is how can I invoke a method and pass in the current value of status for that row in the table. I think I need something like this:
<h:outputText value="#{showRooms.getDisplayedStatus(#{rowRoom.roomStatus})"/>
But that doesn't work. I can invoke the getDisplayedStatus method when passing in a hardcoded parameter, but it won't translate the value of both expressions(the method and the method param). How can I achieve this?
Thanks,
Mike

Answer 1

Yes. I've done that and it does work....sort of. It works as long as I refer to it as 'displayStatus'. It looks up the getDisplayStatus and returns a value. The problem is getting the current status value from the object in the List. For example, the 3rd row in the table has either 'A;' or 'NA' for status. I need to know this value in order to do my translation. The way I see it, I either need
1.)a way to call a method on the backing bean and pass the value of status from the current row into the method.
-or-
2.)in getDisplayStatus, I need a way to access the current row's value, perhaps through an expression. This appears to be what you can do in the AbstractPageBean class that all backing beans inherit in Studio Creator. I've seen code in a getter like 'getValue(#{currentRow.status}'), but I don't know how that is done. I looked for the source to AbstractPageBean on the web but couldn't find it - maybe its not open-source.
Anyway, please share if anyone has a solution. I'm sure this has been done before.
Thanks,
Mike