WEBSITE

Java EE 6 with GlassFish 3 Application Server : Developing our first JSP

8/28/2012 1:06:01 AM

Introduction to JavaServer Pages

In the early days, servlets were the only API available to develop server-side web applications in Java. Servlets had a number of advantages over CGI scripts, which were (and to some extent, still are) prevalent in those days. Some of the advantages of servlets over CGI scripts included increased performance and enhanced security.

However, servlets also had one major disadvantage. As the HTML code to be rendered in the browser needed to be embedded in Java code, most servlet code was very hard to maintain. To overcome this limitation, Java Server Pages (JSP) technology was created. JSPs use a combination of static HTML content and dynamic content to generate web pages. As the static content is separate from the dynamic content, JSP pages are a lot easier to maintain than servlets that generate HTML output.

In most modern applications using JSPs, servlets are still used. However, they typically assume the role of a controller in the Model-View-Controller (MVC) design pattern, with JSPs assuming the role of a view. As controller servlets have no user interface, we don't run into the issue of having HTML markup inside Java code.

Developing our first JSP

JSPs are basically pages containing both static HTML markup and dynamic content. Dynamic content can be generated by using snippets of Java code called scriptlets or by using standard or custom JSP tags. Let's look at a very simple JSP code that displays the current server time in the browser:

<%@ page language="java" contentType="text/html; charset=UTF-8" pageEncoding="UTF-8"%>
<%@ page import="java.util.Date" %>
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/loose.dtd">
<html>
<head>
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8">
<title>Server Date And Time</title>
</head>
<body>
<p>Server date and time: <% out.print(new Date()); %>
</p>
</body>
</html>


					  

To deploy this JSP, all that needs to be done is to put it in a WAR file. Like we mentioned before, the easiest way to deploy the WAR file is to copy it to [glassfish installation directory]/glassfish/domains/domain1/autodeploy.

Quickly deploying simple JSPs

Simple JSPs can be quickly deployed without having to package them in a WAR file by copying them to [glassfish installation directory]/glassfish/domains/domain1/docroot/, and previewed in the browser by pointing them to http://localhost:8080/jspname.jsp.


After a successful deployment, pointing the browser to http://localhost:8080/firstjsp/first.jsp should result in a page like the following:

The Server date and time: string came from the static text immediately following the<p> tag in the JSP page. The actual date and time displayed is the server's date and time. The value came from the output of the code between the<% and %> delimiters. We can place any valid Java code between these two delimiters. Code inside these delimiters is known as a scriptlet. The scriptlet in the previous JSP makes use of the out implicit object. JSP implicit objects are objects that can be readily used in any JSP; no need to declare or initialize them. The out implicit object is an instance of javax.servlet.jsp.JspWriter. It can be thought of as an equivalent of calling the HttpServletResponse.getWriter() method.

The first two lines in the previous JSP are JSP page directives. A JSP page directive defines attributes that apply to the entire JSP page. A JSP page directive can have several attributes. In the previous example, the first page directive sets the language, contentType, charset, and PageEncoding attributes. The second one adds an import statement to the page.

As can be seen in the example, JSP page directive attributes can be combined in a single directive, or a separate page directive can be used for each attribute.

The following table lists all attributes for the page directive:

Attribute Description Valid values Default value
autoFlush Determines whether the output buffer should be flushed automatically when it is full. true or false true
buffer The output buffer size in kilobytes. Nkb, where N is an integer number."none" is also a valid value. 8kb
contentType Determines the page's HTTP response MIME type and character encoding. Any valid MIME type and character encoding combination. text/html ; charset= ISO-8859-1
deferredSyntaxAll owedAsLiteral In earlier versions of the JSP specification, the #{} syntax for the expression language was not reserved. For backwards compatibility purposes, this attribute sets any expressions using this syntax to be string literals. true or false false
errorPage Indicates which page to navigate when the JSP throws an exception. Any valid relative URL to another JSP. N/A
extends Indicates the class this JSP extends. The fully qualified name for the JSP's parent class. N/A
import Imports one or more classes to be used in scriptlets. A fully qualified name of a class to import or the full package name + ".*" to import all necessary classes from the package (for example,<%@ page import java.util.* %>). N/A
info The value for this attribute is incorporated into the compiled JSP. It can later be retrieved by calling the page's getServletInfo() method. Any string. N/A
isELIgnored Setting this value to true prevents expression language expressions from being interpreted. true or false false
isErrorPage Determines if the page is an error page. true or false false
isThreadSafe Determines whether the page is thread safe. true or false true
language Determines the scripting language used in scriptlets, declarations, and expressions in the JSP page. Any scripting language that can execute in the Java Virtual Machine (groovy, jruby, and so on). java
pageEncoding Determines the page encoding, for example, "UTF-8". Any valid page encoding. N/A
session Determines whether the page has access to the HTTP session. true or false true
trimDirectiveWhi tespaces When JSPs are rendered as HTML in the browser, the generated markup frequently has a lot of blank lines in it. Setting this attribute to true prevents these extraneous blank lines from being generated in the markup. true or false false

Of the attributes in the table, errorPage, import, and isErrorPage are the most commonly used. Others have sensible defaults.

When deployed to the application server, JSPs are translated into (compiled into) servlets. The extends attribute of the page directive indicates the generated servlet's parent class. The value of this attribute must be a subclass of javax.servlet.GenericServlet.

Although the language attribute can accept any language that can execute in the Java Virtual Machine, it is extremely rare to use any language other than Java.

Other  
 
Top 10
Review : Sigma 24mm f/1.4 DG HSM Art
Review : Canon EF11-24mm f/4L USM
Review : Creative Sound Blaster Roar 2
Review : Philips Fidelio M2L
Review : Alienware 17 - Dell's Alienware laptops
Review Smartwatch : Wellograph
Review : Xiaomi Redmi 2
Extending LINQ to Objects : Writing a Single Element Operator (part 2) - Building the RandomElement Operator
Extending LINQ to Objects : Writing a Single Element Operator (part 1) - Building Our Own Last Operator
3 Tips for Maintaining Your Cell Phone Battery (part 2) - Discharge Smart, Use Smart
REVIEW
- First look: Apple Watch

- 3 Tips for Maintaining Your Cell Phone Battery (part 1)

- 3 Tips for Maintaining Your Cell Phone Battery (part 2)
VIDEO TUTORIAL
- How to create your first Swimlane Diagram or Cross-Functional Flowchart Diagram by using Microsoft Visio 2010 (Part 1)

- How to create your first Swimlane Diagram or Cross-Functional Flowchart Diagram by using Microsoft Visio 2010 (Part 2)

- How to create your first Swimlane Diagram or Cross-Functional Flowchart Diagram by using Microsoft Visio 2010 (Part 3)
Popular Tags
Microsoft Access Microsoft Excel Microsoft OneNote Microsoft PowerPoint Microsoft Project Microsoft Visio Microsoft Word Active Directory Biztalk Exchange Server Microsoft LynC Server Microsoft Dynamic Sharepoint Sql Server Windows Server 2008 Windows Server 2012 Windows 7 Windows 8 Adobe Indesign Adobe Flash Professional Dreamweaver Adobe Illustrator Adobe After Effects Adobe Photoshop Adobe Fireworks Adobe Flash Catalyst Corel Painter X CorelDRAW X5 CorelDraw 10 QuarkXPress 8 windows Phone 7 windows Phone 8
Visit movie_stars's profile on Pinterest.