What does the PF function do in Primefaces?

Question

On many places one can find usage of a function PF with Primefaces. For example in this answer

From what I have seen so far it seems to be a magic \"mak

Answer 1

For other Primefaces users coming here when upgrading to version 4.0 and above, it's possible to bypass the need to use PF('yourWidgetVar').someFunction() and just use yourWidgetVar.someFunction() directly as you would have before version 4.0. You just need the following configuration in web.xml:

    primefaces.LEGACY_WIDGET_NAMESPACE
    true

From the Primefaces User Guide:

Enables window scope so that widgets can be accessed using widgetVar.method() in addition to default PF namespace approach like PF('widgetVar').method().

Obviously you'd be susceptible to the namespace clash/pollution this feature was created to avoid, but it's useful if you want to migrate to a new version in little steps and isolate what incompatibilities the new version has introduced.