RE: Multi page form desing

[martin . cooper]

If you track the wizard steps (e.g. with a hidden field), then you can 
validate different sets of fields, depending on the current step. At the 
final step, you can do a more complete validation.

--
Martin Cooper
Tumbleweed Communications


At 09:41 AM 11/2/00 -0300, Ansaldo, Gaston wrote:
Peter:
 Thanks for your input but I can't wait until the user has reached
the form's last page because depending on her selections i have to send her
to a different JSP. Any other idea about this?

Thanks again,

 Gastón.

  -Original Message-
  From: Halverson, Peter [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
  Sent: 01 November, 2000 5:51 PM
  To: '[EMAIL PROTECTED]'
  Subject: RE: Multi page form desing
 
 
 
 
   -Original Message-
   From: Ansaldo, Gaston [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
   Sent: Wednesday, November 01, 2000 3:29 PM
   To: '[EMAIL PROTECTED]'
   Subject: Multi page form desing
  
  
   Hi all!!!
  
   I'm trying to implement a *wizard style form* using 4 or 5
   jsp's. I read in
   the user doc's that in Struts one should try to design the
   pages using the
   same Form and Action class for all the pages inside
   the *conceptual
   form*
  
   I'm wondering how I'm suppose to design the Form and
   Action classes
   in order to validate the form data just one time and not as
   many times as
   jsp's invoke the same XXXForm class..
  
   Can anybody share some ideas about how to implement this kind of
   functionality?
 
 
  You'd need to track whether the form is all the way done or
  in progress,
  depending on which screen of the wizard the user has
  completed.  Either
  explicitly, as a form property that gets set by the Action,
  or implicitly,
  perhaps using a custom ActionMapping property (the latter
  makes it easier to
  introduce new pages, IMO, since you can define it as part of your
  struts-config.xml). As long as there still screens to do, the form's
  validate() method would always return true. Only when the
  user has finished
  all the screens do you actually check the form content as
  appropriate.
 
  Ditto for the action, assuming you're using a single Action
  for the entire
  sequence.
 
  The only problem with deferring validation until the wizard
  is complete is
  that it's harder to return the user to the particular page
  associated with
  the bad input.
 
  pete
 

RE: Multi page form desing

[Halverson, Peter]

 -Original Message-
 From: Ansaldo, Gaston [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
 Sent: Wednesday, November 01, 2000 3:29 PM
 To: '[EMAIL PROTECTED]'
 Subject: Multi page form desing
 
 
 Hi all!!!
 
 I'm trying to implement a *wizard style form* using 4 or 5 
 jsp's. I read in
 the user doc's that in Struts one should try to design the 
 pages using the
 same Form and Action class for all the pages inside 
 the *conceptual
 form*
 
 I'm wondering how I'm suppose to design the Form and 
 Action classes
 in order to validate the form data just one time and not as 
 many times as
 jsp's invoke the same XXXForm class..
 
 Can anybody share some ideas about how to implement this kind of
 functionality?


You'd need to track whether the form is all the way done or in progress,
depending on which screen of the wizard the user has completed.  Either
explicitly, as a form property that gets set by the Action, or implicitly,
perhaps using a custom ActionMapping property (the latter makes it easier to
introduce new pages, IMO, since you can define it as part of your
struts-config.xml). As long as there still screens to do, the form's
validate() method would always return true. Only when the user has finished
all the screens do you actually check the form content as appropriate.  

Ditto for the action, assuming you're using a single Action for the entire
sequence. 

The only problem with deferring validation until the wizard is complete is
that it's harder to return the user to the particular page associated with
the bad input.

pete