ICEfaces extends the JSF Request scope into an Ajax environment via the interpretation that a "request" is defined as a full page refresh. In other words, interactions within a single window that do not cause a full page refresh reside within the same "request" scope, causing request-scope beans in ICEfaces to live longer than in standard web applications. This is useful as it allows request scope to distinguish between different windows and maintain the thread of a user's interactions with those windows, but it sacrifices the standard request scope (which is can useful for managing resources within a page).

The ICEfaces request scope should be deprecated and a new explicit mechanism for "window flow" scope should be added. For instance, to instantiate com.mycompany.beans.WindowBean and name it myWindowBean:

<managed-bean>
    <managed-bean-name>ScopeManager</managed-bean-name>
    <managed-bean-class>org.icefaces.application.ScopeManager</managed-bean-class>
    <managed-bean-scope>session</managed-bean-scope>
    <managed-property>
        <property-name>myWindowBean</property-name>
        <value>com.mycompany.beans.WindowBean</value>
    </managed-property>
</managed-bean>

This syntax, however, does not allow any interesting dependency injection or configuration of properties of beans in window flow scope. Instead, it may be preferable to define the desired beans in "none" scope (causing it to be instantiated only when it is referenced) and then register the names of those beans in a list on the ScopeManager.

<managed-bean>
    <managed-bean-name>myWindowBean</managed-bean-name>
    <managed-bean-class> com.mycompany.beans.WindowBean </managed-bean-class>
    <managed-bean-scope>none</managed-bean-scope>
    <managed-property>
        <property-name>property1</property-name>
        <value>42</value>
    </managed-property>
</managed-bean>

<managed-bean>
    <managed-bean-name>ScopeManager</managed-bean-name>
    <managed-bean-class>org.icefaces.application.ScopeManager</managed-bean-class>
    <managed-bean-scope>session</managed-bean-scope>
    <managed-property>
        <property-name>WindowScopeBeans</property-name>
        <values>
            <value>myWindowBean</value>
            <value>myOtherWindowBean</value>
        </values>
    </managed-property>
</managed-bean>

It may also be necessary to implement a custom EL resolver to provide this capability.

Oracle ADF Faces has a pageFlow scope which may have the desired properties:
(however, beans in pageFlow scope are referred to in EL by the pageFlowScope prefix, which may not be desirable. In any case, it is possible we should adopt the "page flow" terminology)

http://www.orablogs.com/jjacobi/archives/000481.html

Spring Web Flow also has a number of good ideas in the same area:

http://www.springframework.org/webflow