WAS v8.5 > WebSphere applications > Portlet applications > Portlet containerPortlet container
The portlet container is the runtime environment for portlets using the JSR 286 Portlet specification, in which portlets are instantiated, used, and finally destroyed. The JSR 286 Portlet API provides standard interfaces for portlets and backwards compatibility for JSR 168 portlets. Portlets that are based on this JSR 286 Portlet Specification are referred to as standard portlets.
The PortletServingServlet servlet provides a simple portal framework, which builds on top of the portlet container. This servlet registers itself with each web application containing portlets. We can use the PortletServingServlet servlet to directly render a portlet into a full browser page by a URL request and invoke each portlet by its context root and name. For more information, see Portlet URL addressability. Also, we can use the URL addressability feature to include remote portlet content using the remote request dispatcher (RRD).
To aggregate multiple portlets on a page, we can use the dedicated aggregation tag library, which is based on the PortletServingServlet servlet. For more information, see Portlet aggregation using JSP for additional information. For coordination between portlets on a given page, the aggregation tag library supports the use of the Public Render Parameters, as specified by the JSR 286 Portlet Specification.
The portal framework, which is provided with the PortletServingServlet servlet, enables you to render only one portlet at a time. Thus, only a subset of the optional features in the JSR 286 Portal Specification are supported. To determine which optional features are supported, see Supported optional features of the JSR 286 Portlet Specification.
The brokering of events between portlets is out of the scope of the specification and is not handled by the PortletServingServlet servlet. For full portlet coordination support, we can deploy the portlets on comprehensive portal products, such as the WebSphere Portal Server.
We can disable the PortletServingServlet servlet in an extended portlet deployment descriptor called the ibm-portlet-ext.xmi file. For more information, see Example: Configuring the extended portlet deployment descriptor to disable PortletServingServlet.
Related concepts:
Portlets
URL addressability
Portlet aggregation using JSP
Supported optional features of the JSR-286 Portlet Specification
Related
Tasks: Managing portlets
Reference:
Portlet container settings
Example: Configuring the extended portlet deployment descriptor to disable PortletServingServlet
Related information:
Introducing the Portlet Specification, Part 1
Introducing the Portlet Specification, Part 2
Introducing Java Portlet Specifications - JSR 168 and JSR 286
Exploiting the WAS V6.1 portlet container
What's new in the Java Portlet Specification V2.0 (JSR 286)