Retaining values when navigating between subtabs

Question

Hello everyone
I have a subtab region with 3 tabs in my page. I have some form fields in each tab, when I enter some details in tab1 and click tab2, and then come back to tab1 , my details previously entered in tab1 gets cleared. is there a way to retain these values when navigating between subtabs. all the tabs are based on different VO's
Thanks
Ravi

Answer 1

Here's how I do it...
(1) I always use Sessions.  In the main form of my application, I set up the session and I store a single variable:  Session.Exists = True.  All other forms begin something like this:  (It's actually an include-file.)
<cflock ...>
<cfset SessionExists = StructKeyExists(Session, "Exists")>
</cflock>
<cfif NOT SessionExists>
   <cflocation ... send 'em back to the home 'cuz their session has expired>
   <cfabort>
</cfif>
(2) Now that we know that a session exists, we store various structs in the Session to contain the default or current values that have been used in a particular form.  If the Session scope does not contain a particular struct, it is automagically created with appropriate default values.)  This becomes "what we display," and when we capture the user's responses, we store them there, even before we validate them.  The session pool therefore becomes the vehicle for communication between the various forms.
(3) If we reach a point where a particular piece of information is no longer useful, we delete the appropriate structure from the Session, thereby wiping out the entire set of values at once.
(4) Structs and Arrays can, of course, contain other Structs and Arrays.  You can build data structures of arbitrary complexity.
(5) As of late, I have found myself specifying individual CFCs for each logical "object" in my application.  This is true object-oriented programming, as best as ordinary CFC techniques can do without plunging headlong into the underlying nether-world of Java.  In those CFCs, I deliberately try to conceal just how information is maintained and stored, so that these necessary inter-dependencies within my application are concentrated in just one place.  "The structure is 'the object,' and the methods are found 'here and only here.' "