How to overcome the error "The unknown namespace tag xe:applicationLayout cannot be used as a control."

1
votes

I created a sort of template DB for my Xpages applications. It is not a true template, just a design I can grab code from to start a new Xpages db.

I copied over a cc and got this error:

"The unknown namespace tag xe:applicationLayout cannot be used as a control, as the namespace http://www.ibm.com/xsp/coreex is not known."

I tried to creating a new cc in the target db and just pasting the source in, still got that error. What does that error mean and how can I overcome it?

I mean, come on, I can't copy and past design elements from one db to another???

2
xpages
Did you activate the usaage of the Extlib in the new database in the page generation settings of the XSP properties? - Oliver Busse
OK I am an idiot. I did not, and when I did everything works fine. Thank you very much Oliver. I am still learning Xpages. - Bryan Schmiedeler

2 Answers

3
votes

It means that you haven't enabled the ExtLib in the application's properties. If you do to the Xsp Properties (in 9.0+) or Application Properties (in ancient releases), you can enable the com.ibm.xsp.extlib.library library, assuming you have it installed.

2
votes

There is an event that can be triggered when dropping a native control onto an XPage or Custom Control. That event is used to enable the library in Xsp Properties. It's also used to enable the relevant abbreviation (xe, xc etc) on the pages. The bottom line is copy and paste isn't that sophisticated!

And it's not exclusive to the Extension Library. Try copying and pasting a Custom Control to a brand new XPage and save it. It will give you virtually the same message, but this time saying "xc" is not bound.

You need to enable the Extension Library manually if you're copying a custom control across. Alternatively, you can just drag and drop any Extension Library control onto any page in the application, then delete it!

If you're copying source code from one XPage to another, if it includes anything other than an xp tag, you need to check the relevant xml namespace is specified in the xp:view tag. So in the case of copying source code for the application layout, also adding xmlns:xe="http://www.ibm.com/xsp/coreex" to the xp:view tag.

(This was too long an elaboration to just add as a comment to Jesse's answer, which I've up-voted)