Because it isn't elegant. You can do it (but you must bind to an EVENT scoped component, or SESSION I guess, just not conversational). N.B. You can also inject the JSF component using @In("#{uiComponent['clientId']}") UIComponent cmp; which I think is much neater (and doesn't have scope restrictions). I haven't used this pattern much, so can't offer best practice advice atm. View the original post : http://www.jboss.com/index.html?module=bb&op=viewtopic&p=4073614#... Reply to the post : http://www.jboss.com/index.html?module=bb&op=posting&mode=reply&a...