Distinguish ajax requests from full requests in JSF custom validator

Question

My validator needs to know if it is a full request or an ajax request. In my current solution I check the http request header for the X-Requested-With element:

Answer 1

I would not rely on http header. Never tried it by myself, but you could do the following:

PartialViewContext pvc = facesContext.getPartialViewContext();
if(pvc.isAjaxRequest()) {
// ...
} else {
// ...
}

Another option is using isPartialRequest() instead of isAjaxRequest()

Answer 2

I'd that it is a reliable way to check it. This is exactly how for example Django checks for AJAX requests:

 def is_ajax(self):
        return self.META.get('HTTP_X_REQUESTED_WITH') == 'XMLHttpRequest'

Also listed here as such: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_HTTP_header_fields