Stateful Action Mechanisms:

The Visualforce stateful action components are most typically bound to a common set of standard
controller actions available for all sObjects associated with any standard controller as referenced
on the page.

The most commonly used action components include:
• apex:commandButton which renders a button that calls an action.
• apex:commandLink which renders a link that calls an action.
• apex:page can call an action upon load with its action attribute.

Additional components are available specifically designed for AJAX processing:
• apex:actionPoller which calls an action on a timer.
• apex:actionSupport which binds to a JavaScript ‘on’ event on a referenced component
to call an action.
• apex:actionFunction that generates code for a JavaScript function to call an action.

The following are the common actions which can be invoked in the context of the sObject
associated with the referenced standard controller:
• List: navigates the user to the default list view.
• View: navigates to the default detail page.

• Cancel: aborts an edit operation, and returns the user to the page where the user originally
invoked an edit or insert.
• Save: inserts a new record or updates an existing record in context, and then returns the user
to the default detail page for the saved record.
• QuickSave: inserts a new record or updates an existing record in context, but unlike the save
it does not redirect the user to another page but leaves the user on the page where the action
was initiated from.
• Edit: navigates to the edit page for the record in context, and then whether saved or
cancelled, returns the user to the page where the action was originally invoked.
• Delete: deletes the record in context, and then navigates the user to the Home Tab of the
associated sObject.

Here is an example of the direct binding syntax for each with an apex:commandButton component:
 <apex:commandButton action=”{!list}” value=”List” />
 <apex:commandButton action=”{!view}” value=”View” />
 <apex:commandButton action=”{!cancel}” value=”Cancel” />
 <apex:commandButton action=”{!save}” value=”Save” />
 <apex:commandButton action=”{!quickSave}” value=”Quick Save” />
 <apex:commandButton action=”{!edit}” value=”Edit” />
 <apex:commandButton action=”{!delete}” value=”Delete” />