AW: AW: AW: using multiple action forms in one action. Best practice?
Bill, you seem to understand my application quite well. The metaphor of region/shops is excellent. What adds a bit of complexity is that the shop-module is just one of several. There might be an additional people-module, a statistical data-module, etc. Thus serializing the editing process in a wizard style would impose an order on the process which is not very pleasant. Also, I would like to reuse the forms/action for editing already existing objects/regions, where the order enforced by a wizard is not appropriate. But I think I have learned fromthis discussion how it could be implemented reasonably. The only exception being the question of scope which is not that important in my case. Martin -Ursprüngliche Nachricht- Von: Bill Keese [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Gesendet: Mittwoch, 17. November 2004 01:48 An: Struts Users Mailing List Betreff: Re: AW: AW: using multiple action forms in one action. Best practice? It's hard for me to answer because I don't really understand your application. JSP1 is for picking a region, and then JSP2 is for picking stores within that region, right? And then after picking the stores, you display a confirmation page with the map and the list of picked stores? When you hit the save button on the confirmation page, the input to the SaveAction is both the selected region and the selected stores, right? So you are combining the information entered on two previous forms. If it was me, I would have 3 separate actions and 3 separate action-forms: 1. select-region 2. select-stores 3. confirm-dialog The confirm-dialog ActionForm would contain both the region information and the list of stores. Thus I would only use one ActionForm per Action, and I wouldn't use session variables. Bill Martin Kindler wrote: Hi Bill, so you say, it is good practice to use the two forms in one action as I do in my current solution? Sure, one has to hide the internals from AF1 to an action primarily designed to use AF2 to keep the address module generic. Perhaps I should make the calling ActionForms implement a specific interface. If I really want a fully generic address module I would have to split the action(s) in two, simply because the actions designed for the address module need a generic API. I cannot rely (for full genericity) on a calling module to use AF1. In my current situation I will probably ignore this as it is a straightforward refactoring which can be done when need occurs. As to the question request vs. session scope I understand the problems which might occur using session scope. I do not see a solution which would also fulfil the modularization requirement. Thanks! Martin -Ursprüngliche Nachricht- Von: Bill Keese [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Gesendet: Dienstag, 16. November 2004 02:10 An: Struts Users Mailing List Betreff: Re: AW: using multiple action forms in one action. Best practice? Hi Martin, From this JSP I want to access a (hopefully) generic module to get the access points. This module has to get some information (e. g. a region to prefilter the addresses or access points already existing) from JSP1. I think you should generate the input to the generic module, rather than passing the ActionForm directly: // get data from ActionForm1 needed to look up addresses AddressLookupInfo info = getAddressInfoFromActionForm1(AF1); // lookup addresses List res = AddressLookup.getAddresses(info); ... Then your module can still be generic. I could take the necessary information from AF1 to some POJO (or bean) on model level (or controller level) and transfer it to AF2. This is probably the cleanest solution but means to split each action into two, just to do the data transfer. You shouldn't need to split each action into two. Action1's job is to handle the input from ActionForm1, and then do the setup to display JSP2, right? So, just create the ActionForm2 manually inside Action1: // Create AF2 as an input/output form ActionForm2 af2 = new ActionForm2(); session.setAttribute(actionForm2, af2); // ... and pre-populate it with the data the user has already input ActionForm1 af1 = (ActionForm1) getActionForm(mapping, form, request, session); af2.loadDataFromAF1(af1); // forward control to JSP2 return (mapping.findForward(jsp2)); My current solution simply accesses both action forms, AF1 and AF2 (getting the one not available as the form-parameter by MyForm mf = (MyForm)session.getAttribute(AFi); but my feeling is that this is not really good style. I guess it depends on whether you consider the two forms to represent one logical command or two logical commands. The other
Re: AW: AW: AW: using multiple action forms in one action. Best practice?
Hi Martin, I see what you mean about the wizard metaphor being inappropriate for your case. Maybe tabbed dialog box is a closer analogy. But I guess that doesn't match exactly either, because the contents of tab B change according to the contents of tab A. Anyway, there are many ways to implement something like that and I guess each has advantages/disadvantages. By the way, in our application, we have a few cases where we process the data entered on multiple forms in one final action. Specifically we do this when we use popup windows, since the concept of ordering of pages becomes more complicated / impossible when there are multiple windows displayed on the screen at a single time. So we save the information from the popup window in the session context, and then reference it when the user hits submit on the main form. By the way, does anyone have experience using popup windows in this way without resorting to using session variables? Anyway, good luck! Bill Martin Kindler wrote: Bill, you seem to understand my application quite well. The metaphor of region/shops is excellent. What adds a bit of complexity is that the shop-module is just one of several. There might be an additional people-module, a statistical data-module, etc. Thus serializing the editing process in a wizard style would impose an order on the process which is not very pleasant. Also, I would like to reuse the forms/action for editing already existing objects/regions, where the order enforced by a wizard is not appropriate. But I think I have learned fromthis discussion how it could be implemented reasonably. The only exception being the question of scope which is not that important in my case. Martin -Ursprüngliche Nachricht- Von: Bill Keese [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Gesendet: Mittwoch, 17. November 2004 01:48 An: Struts Users Mailing List Betreff: Re: AW: AW: using multiple action forms in one action. Best practice? It's hard for me to answer because I don't really understand your application. JSP1 is for picking a region, and then JSP2 is for picking stores within that region, right? And then after picking the stores, you display a confirmation page with the map and the list of picked stores? When you hit the save button on the confirmation page, the input to the SaveAction is both the selected region and the selected stores, right? So you are combining the information entered on two previous forms. If it was me, I would have 3 separate actions and 3 separate action-forms: 1. select-region 2. select-stores 3. confirm-dialog The confirm-dialog ActionForm would contain both the region information and the list of stores. Thus I would only use one ActionForm per Action, and I wouldn't use session variables. Bill Martin Kindler wrote: Hi Bill, so you say, it is good practice to use the two forms in one action as I do in my current solution? Sure, one has to hide the internals from AF1 to an action primarily designed to use AF2 to keep the address module generic. Perhaps I should make the calling ActionForms implement a specific interface. If I really want a fully generic address module I would have to split the action(s) in two, simply because the actions designed for the address module need a generic API. I cannot rely (for full genericity) on a calling module to use AF1. In my current situation I will probably ignore this as it is a straightforward refactoring which can be done when need occurs. As to the question request vs. session scope I understand the problems which might occur using session scope. I do not see a solution which would also fulfil the modularization requirement. Thanks! Martin -Ursprüngliche Nachricht- Von: Bill Keese [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Gesendet: Dienstag, 16. November 2004 02:10 An: Struts Users Mailing List Betreff: Re: AW: using multiple action forms in one action. Best practice? Hi Martin, From this JSP I want to access a (hopefully) generic module to get the access points. This module has to get some information (e. g. a region to prefilter the addresses or access points already existing) from JSP1. I think you should generate the input to the generic module, rather than passing the ActionForm directly: // get data from ActionForm1 needed to look up addresses AddressLookupInfo info = getAddressInfoFromActionForm1(AF1); // lookup addresses List res = AddressLookup.getAddresses(info); ... Then your module can still be generic. I could take the necessary information from AF1 to some POJO (or bean) on model level (or controller level) and transfer it to AF2. This is probably the cleanest solution but means to split each action
AW: AW: using multiple action forms in one action. Best practice?
Hi Bill, so you say, it is good practice to use the two forms in one action as I do in my current solution? Sure, one has to hide the internals from AF1 to an action primarily designed to use AF2 to keep the address module generic. Perhaps I should make the calling ActionForms implement a specific interface. If I really want a fully generic address module I would have to split the action(s) in two, simply because the actions designed for the address module need a generic API. I cannot rely (for full genericity) on a calling module to use AF1. In my current situation I will probably ignore this as it is a straightforward refactoring which can be done when need occurs. As to the question request vs. session scope I understand the problems which might occur using session scope. I do not see a solution which would also fulfil the modularization requirement. Thanks! Martin -Ursprüngliche Nachricht- Von: Bill Keese [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Gesendet: Dienstag, 16. November 2004 02:10 An: Struts Users Mailing List Betreff: Re: AW: using multiple action forms in one action. Best practice? Hi Martin, From this JSP I want to access a (hopefully) generic module to get the access points. This module has to get some information (e. g. a region to prefilter the addresses or access points already existing) from JSP1. I think you should generate the input to the generic module, rather than passing the ActionForm directly: // get data from ActionForm1 needed to look up addresses AddressLookupInfo info = getAddressInfoFromActionForm1(AF1); // lookup addresses List res = AddressLookup.getAddresses(info); ... Then your module can still be generic. I could take the necessary information from AF1 to some POJO (or bean) on model level (or controller level) and transfer it to AF2. This is probably the cleanest solution but means to split each action into two, just to do the data transfer. You shouldn't need to split each action into two. Action1's job is to handle the input from ActionForm1, and then do the setup to display JSP2, right? So, just create the ActionForm2 manually inside Action1: // Create AF2 as an input/output form ActionForm2 af2 = new ActionForm2(); session.setAttribute(actionForm2, af2); // ... and pre-populate it with the data the user has already input ActionForm1 af1 = (ActionForm1) getActionForm(mapping, form, request, session); af2.loadDataFromAF1(af1); // forward control to JSP2 return (mapping.findForward(jsp2)); My current solution simply accesses both action forms, AF1 and AF2 (getting the one not available as the form-parameter by MyForm mf = (MyForm)session.getAttribute(AFi); but my feeling is that this is not really good style. I guess it depends on whether you consider the two forms to represent one logical command or two logical commands. The other thing to consider, though, is whether or not you want to store the ActionForms at session scope. Session scope is problematic because you might end up accessing old data (if the user previously quit in the middle of a wizard). Also, I imagine things would fail in a distributed application where the user's requests are randomly routed to multiple servers.The alternative is to use request level scope, but in this case the information entered in Form#1 has to be embedded in the output of JSP2 as hidden HTML variables. Bill - To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] - To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: AW: AW: using multiple action forms in one action. Best practice?
It's hard for me to answer because I don't really understand your application. JSP1 is for picking a region, and then JSP2 is for picking stores within that region, right? And then after picking the stores, you display a confirmation page with the map and the list of picked stores? When you hit the save button on the confirmation page, the input to the SaveAction is both the selected region and the selected stores, right? So you are combining the information entered on two previous forms. If it was me, I would have 3 separate actions and 3 separate action-forms: 1. select-region 2. select-stores 3. confirm-dialog The confirm-dialog ActionForm would contain both the region information and the list of stores. Thus I would only use one ActionForm per Action, and I wouldn't use session variables. Bill Martin Kindler wrote: Hi Bill, so you say, it is good practice to use the two forms in one action as I do in my current solution? Sure, one has to hide the internals from AF1 to an action primarily designed to use AF2 to keep the address module generic. Perhaps I should make the calling ActionForms implement a specific interface. If I really want a fully generic address module I would have to split the action(s) in two, simply because the actions designed for the address module need a generic API. I cannot rely (for full genericity) on a calling module to use AF1. In my current situation I will probably ignore this as it is a straightforward refactoring which can be done when need occurs. As to the question request vs. session scope I understand the problems which might occur using session scope. I do not see a solution which would also fulfil the modularization requirement. Thanks! Martin -Ursprüngliche Nachricht- Von: Bill Keese [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Gesendet: Dienstag, 16. November 2004 02:10 An: Struts Users Mailing List Betreff: Re: AW: using multiple action forms in one action. Best practice? Hi Martin, From this JSP I want to access a (hopefully) generic module to get the access points. This module has to get some information (e. g. a region to prefilter the addresses or access points already existing) from JSP1. I think you should generate the input to the generic module, rather than passing the ActionForm directly: // get data from ActionForm1 needed to look up addresses AddressLookupInfo info = getAddressInfoFromActionForm1(AF1); // lookup addresses List res = AddressLookup.getAddresses(info); ... Then your module can still be generic. I could take the necessary information from AF1 to some POJO (or bean) on model level (or controller level) and transfer it to AF2. This is probably the cleanest solution but means to split each action into two, just to do the data transfer. You shouldn't need to split each action into two. Action1's job is to handle the input from ActionForm1, and then do the setup to display JSP2, right? So, just create the ActionForm2 manually inside Action1: // Create AF2 as an input/output form ActionForm2 af2 = new ActionForm2(); session.setAttribute(actionForm2, af2); // ... and pre-populate it with the data the user has already input ActionForm1 af1 = (ActionForm1) getActionForm(mapping, form, request, session); af2.loadDataFromAF1(af1); // forward control to JSP2 return (mapping.findForward(jsp2)); My current solution simply accesses both action forms, AF1 and AF2 (getting the one not available as the form-parameter by MyForm mf = (MyForm)session.getAttribute(AFi); but my feeling is that this is not really good style. I guess it depends on whether you consider the two forms to represent one logical command or two logical commands. The other thing to consider, though, is whether or not you want to store the ActionForms at session scope. Session scope is problematic because you might end up accessing old data (if the user previously quit in the middle of a wizard). Also, I imagine things would fail in a distributed application where the user's requests are randomly routed to multiple servers.The alternative is to use request level scope, but in this case the information entered in Form#1 has to be embedded in the output of JSP2 as hidden HTML variables. Bill - To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] - To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] - To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: AW: using multiple action forms in one action. Best practice?
Hi Martin, From this JSP I want to access a (hopefully) generic module to get the access points. This module has to get some information (e. g. a region to prefilter the addresses or access points already existing) from JSP1. I think you should generate the input to the generic module, rather than passing the ActionForm directly: // get data from ActionForm1 needed to look up addresses AddressLookupInfo info = getAddressInfoFromActionForm1(AF1); // lookup addresses List res = AddressLookup.getAddresses(info); ... Then your module can still be generic. I could take the necessary information from AF1 to some POJO (or bean) on model level (or controller level) and transfer it to AF2. This is probably the cleanest solution but means to split each action into two, just to do the data transfer. You shouldn't need to split each action into two. Action1's job is to handle the input from ActionForm1, and then do the setup to display JSP2, right? So, just create the ActionForm2 manually inside Action1: // Create AF2 as an input/output form ActionForm2 af2 = new ActionForm2(); session.setAttribute(actionForm2, af2); // ... and pre-populate it with the data the user has already input ActionForm1 af1 = (ActionForm1) getActionForm(mapping, form, request, session); af2.loadDataFromAF1(af1); // forward control to JSP2 return (mapping.findForward(jsp2)); My current solution simply accesses both action forms, AF1 and AF2 (getting the one not available as the form-parameter by MyForm mf = (MyForm)session.getAttribute(AFi); but my feeling is that this is not really good style. I guess it depends on whether you consider the two forms to represent one logical command or two logical commands. The other thing to consider, though, is whether or not you want to store the ActionForms at session scope. Session scope is problematic because you might end up accessing old data (if the user previously quit in the middle of a wizard). Also, I imagine things would fail in a distributed application where the user's requests are randomly routed to multiple servers.The alternative is to use request level scope, but in this case the information entered in Form#1 has to be embedded in the output of JSP2 as hidden HTML variables. Bill - To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: AW: using multiple action forms in one action. Best practice?
Hi Martin, From this JSP I want to access a (hopefully) generic module to get the access points. This module has to get some information (e. g. a region to prefilter the addresses or access points already existing) from JSP1. I think you should generate the input to the generic module, rather than passing the ActionForm directly: // get data from ActionForm1 needed to look up addresses AddressLookupInfo info = getAddressInfoFromActionForm1(AF1); // lookup addresses List res = AddressLookup.getAddresses(info); ... Then your module can still be generic. I could take the necessary information from AF1 to some POJO (or bean) on model level (or controller level) and transfer it to AF2. This is probably the cleanest solution but means to split each action into two, just to do the data transfer. You shouldn't need to split each action into two. Action1's job is to handle the input from ActionForm1, and then do the setup to display JSP2, right? So, just create the ActionForm2 manually inside Action1: // Create AF2 as an input/output form ActionForm2 af2 = new ActionForm2(); session.setAttribute(actionForm2, af2); // ... and pre-populate it with the data the user has already input ActionForm1 af1 = (ActionForm1) getActionForm(mapping, form, request, session); af2.loadDataFromAF1(af1); // forward control to JSP2 return (mapping.findForward(jsp2)); My current solution simply accesses both action forms, AF1 and AF2 (getting the one not available as the form-parameter by MyForm mf = (MyForm)session.getAttribute(AFi); but my feeling is that this is not really good style. I guess it depends on whether you consider the two forms to represent one logical command or two logical commands. The other thing to consider, though, is whether or not you want to store the ActionForms at session scope. Session scope is problematic because you might end up accessing old data (if the user previously quit in the middle of a wizard). Also, I imagine things would fail in a distributed application where the user's requests are randomly routed to multiple servers.The alternative is to use request level scope, but in this case the information entered in Form#1 has to be embedded in the output of JSP2 as hidden HTML variables. Bill - To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: using multiple action forms in one action. Best practice?
Martin Kindler wrote: in my application I have a rather complex object to deal with. I have split the process in several jsps (JSP1, ..., JSPn) using different ActionForms (AF1, ..., AFm)... 2. merge all ActionForms to one big mega ActionForm Pro: works Con: no modularization; if I need to use one (partial) ActionForm in another place, I have to take everything or replicate the needed part You are talking about a wizard, right? IE, one logical form split over several JSP pages. In that case, I think you should just use one ActionForm with the data from all the JSP pages. I think the manual says something to the same effect. You can either: 1. make the ActionForm a session level form (see http://www.ajug.org/archive/ajug-members/10203/msg00066.html) 2. (or) make the ActionForm request level, in which case all your JSP pages must have hiden fields representing the data that has already been input on the previous JSP pages. I'm not sure how to do the forwarding from one JSP page to the next page (preserving the contents of the partially filled ActionForm). Do you need to write a dummy Action for each JSP page, or can you/should you forward directly from one JSP page to the next one, like this? Try it out and let me know, if you can. action path=/wizardPage1 name=wizardForm forward=/wizardPage2.jsp /action action path=/wizardPage2 name=wizardForm forward=/wizardPage3.jsp /action Bill - To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
using multiple action forms in one action. Best practice?
Hi, in my application I have a rather complex object to deal with. I have split the process in several jsps (JSP1, ..., JSPn) using different ActionForms (AF1, ..., AFm) with them. I need information collected in one JSPi (using AFi) in another JSPj (using AFj). How can I access both Afi and Afj in one action? Or, is it wise to do so? I can imagine three possibilities: 1. really use both ActionForms (they have to be session scoped) in one action. One being passed as parameter, the other fetched from the session when needed. Pro: easy to implement Con: I do not know whether there is an official way to access the second one (never found it mentioned somewhere) 2. merge all ActionForms to one big mega ActionForm Pro: works Con: no modularization; if I need to use one (partial) ActionForm in another place, I have to take everything or replicate the needed part 3. split the action in two: the first one using AFi and storing the interesting part in some shared buffer, the second reading the buffer and populating AFj accordingly: Pro: theoretically clean Con: a lot of extra actions What would you suggest? Martin - To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
using multiple action forms in one action. Best practice?
Hi, in my application I have a rather complex object to deal with. I have split the process in several jsps (JSP1, ..., JSPn) using different ActionForms (AF1, ..., AFm) with them. I need information collected in one JSPi (using AFi) in another JSPj (using AFj). How can I access both Afi and Afj in one action? Or, is it wise to do so? I can imagine three possibilities: 1. really use both ActionForms (they have to be session scoped) in one action. One being passed as parameter, the other fetched from the session when needed. Pro: easy to implement Con: I do not know whether there is an official way to access the second one (never found it mentioned somewhere) 2. merge all ActionForms to one big mega ActionForm Pro: works Con: no modularization; if I need to use one (partial) ActionForm in another place, I have to take everything or replicate the needed part 3. split the action in two: the first one using AFi and storing the interesting part in some shared buffer, the second reading the buffer and populating AFj accordingly: Pro: theoretically clean Con: a lot of extra actions What would you suggest? Martin - To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
