At the high level: The JSTL tags are nice. The JSTL expression language
(now adopted by JSP 2.0) is powerful enough to completely eliminate the
need for scriptlets and runtime expressions in JSP pages. JSP 2.0 page
compilers will also let you use EL expressions directly in template text,
not just in tag attributes.
At the low level: Given that you have to use *some* syntax for this
stuff, picking a syntax that lots of people are already familiar with
seems a lot smarter than making one up and having to teach it to all your
page authors :-).
Craig
On Wed, 11 Sep 2002, Donald Ball wrote:
> Date: Wed, 11 Sep 2002 11:17:27 -0400
> From: Donald Ball <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> Reply-To: Struts Users Mailing List <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>,
> [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> To: [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> Subject: RE: Additional <logic:iterate> helper tags wanted
>
> On 9/6/2002 at 4:46 PM Martin Cooper wrote:
>
> >If you're using a JSP 1.2 container (e.g. Tomcat 4.x, Resin 2.x), you can
> >do
> >this (and many other cool things) using the JSTL <c:forEach> tag:
> >
> > <c:forEach items="items" var="item" varStatus="status">
> > <c:out value="${item}"/>
> > <c:if test="${!status.last}">
> > ...is followed by...
> > </c:if>
> > </c:forEach>
> >
> >This is a great reason to start getting familiar with JSTL. :-)
>
> (sorry for resurrecting an old thread, I neglected to post my thoughts
> earlier)
>
> This is what totally bugs me about JSP pages, I'm curious to see if anyone
> else here shares my concerns. Early JSP pages freely mingled java code
> (scriptlets) and html markup. This development style was quickly seen to be
> poor for a few reasons:
>
> * java coders and html designers had to edit the same files, causing no end
> of confusion and synchronization problems
>
> * the intermingling of logic and design makes pages messy and hard to
> maintain
>
> * it was difficult to reuse code from page to page, except by cutting and
> pasting
>
> Taglibs are offered as a solution for this, but I wonder how effective they
> really are at solving these problems. Instead of writing <% for (int i=0;
> i<... etc %> you write <c:forEach pre="{$i}=0" ... > or what have you.
> Okay, it's arguably nicer looking and easier to validate since it tends to
> follow standard xml syntax rules instead of the <% %> hacks, but does it
> really solve the aforementioned problems? Sure, disciplined developers can
> reuse code more easily by writing (and debugging!) their own taglibs, but
> the first two problems remain.
>
> And in the end condition, when you can do anything using JSTL or whatever
> other taglibs that you could have written in Java, haven't you just come up
> with an xml grammar for the Java language? Which might be intellectually
> interesting, but who wants to _program_ using a verbose syntax like xml?
> (If you wanted to use lisp, go ahead and use lisp. :))
>
> I'm obviously not a jsp devotee. I think xslt is the natural bridge between
> the model objects and the html view. But millions of jsp coders can't be
> all wrong, right? What benefits am I glossing over or disregarding?
>
> - donald
>
>
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