isFormChangeRequest for wizard forms

[msqr]

I have a wizard-based form that I would like to be able to submit a "refresh" of the current page to re-load reference data but not perform any validation. This would be similar to the SimpleFormController's isFormChangeRequest() method. I can't see a good way to accomplish this in the AbstractWizardFormController class, and was wondering if there was anything I might be missing before I start to come up with a solution.

[gmatthews]

I'm interested in this as well.

It would be useful if AbstractFormController (parent class for both Simple + AbstractWizard form controllers) had the following template methods:

boolean suppressValidation(HttpServletRequest)
boolean suppressBind(HttpServletRequest)

or maybe only one method is needed? Does suppressing validation mean you probably also want to suppressBind, or vice-versa...

Spring Team, any thoughts on how to do this?

[msqr]

For me at least suppressing validation does not mean I want to suppress binding. I do not want to lose any changes a user might have made to the form. My scenario is something like this:

1) a form has a drop-down menu with "things" in it, and the last "thing" in the list says "Add a new 'thing'"
2) the user selects the "Add a new 'thing' option, which causes some JavaScript code to open a new window, and the user is guided through a different form that in effect adds a new "thing" to the back end
3) when the user has added the new "thing" to the back end, the pop-up window closes, and the original form page "refreshes" so the drop-down menu now displays the new "thing" in the list

So in this case, if the user perhaps made some changes to the original form before causing that form to "refresh" I do want data binding to occur so their changes are not lost.