Introduction To Java Servlet Technology

Introduction to Java Servlet technology
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Table of contents
If you're viewing this document online, you can click any of the topics below to link directly to that
section.
1. Before you start ................................................................................... 2

2. An introduction to servlets ................................................................... 4
3. A simple servlet ................................................................................... 7
4. Action servlets ................................................................................... 13
5. Users and data .................................................................................. 29
6. Using servlets effectively ................................................................... 38
7. Wrap-up and resources ..................................................................... 41
Introduction to Java Servlet technology Page 1 of 42

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Section 1. Before you start
About this tutorial

How do the pages you're reading in your favorite Web browser show up there?
When you log into your favorite Web site, how does the Web site know that
you're you? And how do Web retailers handle taking your order online? Those
capabilities are possible because of code running on servers behind the scenes
that interact with you in a Web session, access stored information throughout
that process, and oftentimes present dynamic information in one or more Web
pages. The core of those capabilities is provided in the Java language world by
servlets. The goal of this tutorial is to introduce you to servlets. It describes what
servlets are, how they work, how you can use them to create Web applications
of any degree of sophistication you can imagine, and how you can use servlets
most effectively as a professional programmer.
The content of this tutorial is geared toward Java programmers who are
unfamiliar, or only vaguely familiar, with servlets. It assumes a general
knowledge of downloading and installing software, and a general knowledge of
the Java language (creating classes, importing classes, etc.), but doesn't
assume knowledge of servlets. The tutorial includes a simple example to
illustrate basic servlet concepts, and a more involved example that illustrates
more sophisticated use of servlets in a small contact management application.
Should I take this tutorial?
If you've been writing Web apps for a decade, this tutorial is not for you. If you
don't know what servlets are, or are only vaguely familiar with them, keep
reading. There is much more to servlets than what is included in this tutorial, but
this is a good place to start your learning.
You should, however, have the fundamentals of Java programming well in

hand. If you're not quite there yet, try my Introduction to Java programming
tutorial to get started.
Tools and code

To run the examples or sample code in this tutorial, you'll need to have at least
JDK 1.4.2 or higher, along with the Eclipse IDE, installed on your machine. We'll
walk through the process of installing the Tomcat plugin for Eclipse, which will
allow you to develop servlet applications easily.
All code examples in this tutorial have been tested with J2SE 1.4.2 on the
Windows XP platform, but should work without modification using J2SE 1.4.1,
or even 5.0.
Page 2 of 42 Introduction to Java Servlet technology

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To install Tomcat, go to the Jakarta Web site (see Resources on page 41) and
download the binary distribution of Tomcat 5.0.28 (the most current version that
works with J2SE 1.4.2, as of this writing). The package comes with a Windows
installer that makes installing on that platform a breeze. Follow the instructions
in the readme files, and you'll be set.
To install the Tomcat plugin for Eclipse, go to the Sysdeo Web site (see
Resources on page 41) and download the plugin zip file (tomcatPluginV3.zip, as
of this writing). Then simply extract it to your plugins directory, and follow the
instructions at the bottom of the download page to set up the plugin. To be sure
your plugin is working correctly, work through the very simple HelloWorld servlet
setup "tutorial" that is linked at the bottom of the Sysdeo page (see Resources
on page 41 for a direct link).
Once you have Tomcat and the plugin installed, you're ready to begin this
tutorial.
About the author

Roy Miller is an independent software development coach, programmer, and
author. He began his career at Andersen Consulting (now Accenture), and most
recently spent three years using the Java platform professionally at RoleModel
Software, Inc., in Holly Springs, NC. He has developed software, managed
teams, and coached other programmers at clients ranging from two-person
start-ups to Fortune 50 companies.
For technical questions or comments about the content of this tutorial, contact
Roy at roy@roywmiller.com or click Feedback at the top of any panel.

Section 2. An introduction to servlets
What does a servlet do?

When you use an interactive Web site, all that you see is what's in the browser.
Behind the scenes, there's a Web server taking requests from you in a session,
possibly handing off to other code (maybe on other servers) to process the
request and access data, and generating results to display in the browser.
A servlet is the gatekeeper for that process. It lives on the Web server and
handles incoming requests and outgoing responses. It has nothing to do with
presentation, generally speaking, and really shouldn't. You can use a servlet to
write to a stream that adds content to a Web page, but that's usually not a good
idea either, because it tends to encourage mixing presentation with business
logic.
Servlet alternatives
Servlets aren't the only way to serve up Web pages. One of the earliest
technologies for this purpose was the common gateway interface (CGI), but that
forked a separate process for each request, which wasn't very efficient. There
were also proprietary server extensions like the Netscape Server API (NSAPI),
but those were, well, proprietary. And in the Microsoft world, there is the active
server pages (ASP) standard. Servlets provide an alternative to all of these, and
they offer several advantages:
° They're as platform independent as the Java language
° They give you full access to the entire Java language API, including libraries
for data access (like JDBC)
° They're (in most cases) inherently more efficient than CGI, because servlets
spawn new threads, rather than separate processes, for requests
° There is extensive industry support for servlets, including containers for most
popular Web and application servers
Servlets are a powerful addition to the professional programmer's toolbox.
But what is a servlet?

Most Java servlets that you'll encounter as a professional programmer are

designed to respond to HTTP requests in the context of a Web application. As

such, the HTTP-specific classes in the javax.servlet and
javax.servlet.http packages are the ones you'll care about.
When you create a Java servlet, you typically subclass HttpServlet. This
class has methods that give you access to the request and response wrappers
you can use to handle requests and create responses.
The HTTP protocol isn't Java-specific, of course. It is simply a specification that

defines what service requests and responses have to look like. The Java servlet
classes wrap those low-level constructs in Java classes with convenience
methods that make them easier to deal with in a Java language context. When
a user issues a request via a URL, the Java servlet classes convert it to an
HttpServletRequest and send it to the target pointed to by the URL, as
defined in configuration files for the particular servlet container you're using.
When the server side has done its work, the Java Runtime Environment
packages the results in an HttpServletResponse and then sends a raw
HTTP response back to the client that made the request. When you're
interacting with a Web app, you usually make multiple requests and get multiple
responses. All of them are within the context of a session, which Java language
wraps in an HttpSession object. You can access this object when you
process requests, and add stuff to it when you create responses. It provides
some cross-request context.
A container, like Tomcat, manages the runtime environment for servlets. You
can configure the container to customize the way in which the J2EE server
functions, and you must configure it to expose your servlets to the world. As
we'll see, through various configuration files in the container, you provide a
bridge from a URL (entered by a user in a browser) to the server-side
components that handle the request that you want the URL to translate into.
When your app runs, the container loads and initializes your servlet(s), and
manages their lifecycle.
When we say that servlets have a lifecycle, we simply mean that things happen
in a predictable way when a servlet is invoked. In other words, certain methods
on any servlet you create will always get called in the same order. Here's a
typical scenario:
° A user enters a URL in his browser. Your Web server configuration file says
that this URL points to a servlet managed by a servlet container running on
your server.
° If an instance of the servlet hasn't been created yet (there's only one
instance of a servlet for an application), the container loads the class and
instantiates it.
° The container calls init() on the servlet.
° The container calls service() on the servlet, and passes in a wrapped

HttpServletRequest and HttpServletResponse.

° The servlet typically accesses elements in the request, delegates to other

server-side classes to perform the requested service and to access
resources like databases, then populates the response using that
information
° If necessary, when the servlet's useful life is done, the container calls
destroy() on the servlet to finalize it.
How do you "run" a servlet?

"Running" a servlet is like running a Java program. Once you've configured your
container to know about the servlet, and to know that certain URLs should
cause the container to invoke the servlet, the container will call the lifecycle
methods in the proscribed order. So, running a servlet essentially means
configuring it correctly, then pointing a browser to the right URL. Of course, the
code in the servlet is where the interesting business logic happens. You don't
have to worry about the low-level stuff that's going on, unless something goes
wrong.
Unfortunately, something does go wrong frustratingly often, especially when

you're setting up a servlet. The single biggest cause of headaches with servlet
applications is configuration files. You can't effectively debug them. You simply
have to get them right by trial and error, as you try to decipher the error
messages that you may or may not see in your browser.

Section 3. A simple servlet
What our simple servlet does

Our first servlet will do very little, but it will expose all of the basics of writing a
servlet. The output will be some simple, unformatted text in a browser window:
Hello, World!
In creating this servlet, we'll be able to confirm that Tomcat functions as it ought
to, and that we can use Eclipse to create a Web project like we should be able
to. We'll also walk through the process of configuring your Web app in the
Tomcat servlet container, which can be a bear if you happen make a slight
mistake in an XML file. Don't worry: In this tutorial, at least, it will all work.
In this first example, we'll write output to the browser directly from our servlet.
This will be the last time in the tutorial that we use that approach.
Setting up Eclipse
There are a few things we need to do to make sure we can create and manage
Tomcat projects in Eclipse.
If you've installed the plugin (by simply extracting the Sysdeo zip file to your
eclipse/plugins directory), you should get some additional menu items and tools
on your toolbar. These are indicated in Figure 1.
Figure 1. Tomcat plugin features

The toolbar buttons let you start, stop, and restart Tomcat, which you'll have to
do when you want to run your servlets.
To allow us to create Tomcat projects, which have the correct layout to facilitate
Tomcat deployment, we have to tell Eclipse a few things. If you click
Window>Preferences, you'll see the standard Eclipse preferences dialog, with
a new category called Tomcat at the bottom of the list. Clicking on that will
show you the main Tomcat preferences page (see Figure 2).
Figure 2. Tomcat preferences
Select Version 5.x, and specify the Tomcat home location. (On my system,
this location is C:\Program Files\Apache Software Foundation\Tomcat 5.0, but
yours may vary.) Select Context files as the context declaration mode. Then
click on the JVM Settings preferences subcategory and make sure there's a
valid JRE selected in the drop-down menu at the top of the page. You can use
the default JRE, or you can point to your JDK, which you can tell Eclipse about
in the Java>Installed JREs preferences page.
When you're done, click OK. We're now ready to create a Tomcat project.
Creating a Tomcat project

The Tomcat plugin makes life much easier for the Web developer using
Tomcat. If you click File>New>Project, and expand the Java wizard category
in the dialog (see Figure 3), you'll see a new kind of a project wizard there: a
Tomcat project.
Figure 3. New Tomcat project
Click Next, name the project "HelloWorld," then click Finish. If you switch to the
Java perspective in Eclipse, you'll be able to see that new project. It has a
structure that will facilitate deployment to Tomcat (see Figure 4).
Figure 4. Tomcat project structure

The work, WEB-INF, and WEB-INF/src directories are particularly important, as

we'll see later.
Testing Tomcat
Click the Start Tomcat toolbar button. Eclipse should update your console with
informational statements as Tomcat tries to launch. If it launches without
showing any stack traces, you're set. If you see any stack traces in there, life
becomes slightly more difficult. Unfortunately, trial and error (with your good
friend Google) is the only way to track down any errors that occur. The good
news is that starting with a fresh, new project like we did should eliminate the
possibility of any nasty errors.
When Tomcat starts, you won't see anything (except the console content).
You'll have to test it to be sure it's working. If you want a quick indication, try
opening a browser and entering the following URL:
http://localhost:8080/
If all goes well, you should see either a nice Tomcat welcome page, or a
directory listing for the Tomcat "ROOT context." Don't worry about the second
one. We'll prove Tomcat is working when we run our first servlet.
Declaring the class

A servlet is a class, so let's create a basic one. In Eclipse, create a class called
HelloWorldServlet in your HelloWorld project. It should look like this:
public class HelloWorldServlet extends HttpServlet {
public void service(HttpServletRequest request, HttpServletResponse response)

throws ServletException, IOException {

PrintWriter writer = response.getWriter();
writer.println("Hello, World!");
writer.close();
}
}
Enter this code, then press Ctrl+Shift+O to organize your import statements.
Eclipse should give you imports for the following classes:
° java.io.IOException
° java.io.PrintWriter
° javax.servlet.ServletException
° javax.servlet.HttpServlet
° javax.servlet.HttpServletRequest
° javax.servlet.HttpServletResponse
Notice that we subclassed HttpServlet, and that we overrode the

service() method. The service() method is the most basic processing
method that the servlet engine will call in our servlet's lifecycle. It takes a
request wrapper and a response wrapper, which we can access in our method.
We have no need to do so here, though, since we're just doing something basic
to get a servlet working. We could have overridden doGet(), but service()
will give us what we need.
In our service() method, we called getWriter() on our response

wrapper to allow us to print a string literal to that stream. Then we closed the
stream. That's typical in a servlet that produces output: You perform the logic
you need to perform, then you write to the output stream.
Configuring the Web application

The Java programming work is done, but now we have to do the necessary
work with the configuration files. In my opinion, this is the biggest headache of
Web development. Fortunately, the Tomcat plugin takes away some of the pain.
Right-click on the HelloWorld project and select Properties. Select the Tomcat
category of properties. You should see a context for the project that looks
something like this:
/HelloWorld
Now go look at the filesystem in your Tomcat home. Drill down to the
conf/Catalina/localhost subdirectory. There, you should see a set of XML files.
Specifically, you should see a HelloWorld.xml file. Open that. This file defines a
Web application context for Tomcat.

<Context path="/HelloWorld" reloadable="true" docBase="path to your project\HelloWorld"

workDir="path to your project\HelloWorld\work" />
When Tomcat launches, it reads these context files to tell the servlet container
where to find your classes (which include your servlets). If you look back at the
INFO statements Tomcat spits out to the console when it's loading, you'll see
information about your Web application context in the list.
The last step for configuring your Web application in Tomcat is to create a
web.xml file, which needs to live in the WEB-INF directory of your project.
(Note: Do not put it in the WEB-INF/src directory -- that's for other things.)
Here's what the file should look like for this simple example:
<!DOCTYPE web-app PUBLIC '-//Sun Microsystems, Inc.//DTD

Web Application 2.3//EN' 'http://java.sun.com/dtd/web-app_2_3.dtd'>
<web-app>
<servlet>
<servlet-name>hello</servlet-name>
<servlet-class>HelloWorldServlet</servlet-class>
</servlet>
<servlet-mapping>
<servlet-name>hello</servlet-name>
<url-pattern>/hello</url-pattern>
</servlet-mapping>
</web-app>
This file defines your Web application to Tomcat. The servlet-name element
names your servlet for use in this file. The servlet-class element maps that
name to a particular class that defines the servlet -- HelloWorldServlet, in
our example. The servlet-mapping element tells Tomcat that URLs of the
form (in this case) /hello map to our servlet, which is defined by the mapped
servlet class.
Once we have this file in place, we can fire up Tomcat and see our servlet load.
Running the servlet

As I mentioned earlier, "running the servlet" simply involves starting Tomcat and
pointing a Web browser to the URL that should invoke it. Start Tomcat using the
appropriate toolbar button (you'll need to stop it and start again if it's already
running). Once Tomcat finishes launching, start a browser and enter the
following URL:
http://localhost:8080/HelloWorld/hello
You should see a nice message in your browser window.

Section 4. Action servlets
Introduction
In the early days of Web development, many professional programmers had to
figure out how to use servlets well as they went along. One of the most common
results was an explosion of servlets on the server. There was one for each type
of request.
That quickly became painful, so programmers started to include conditional

logic in their servlets to make them more adaptable, handling multiple types of
requests. Over time, that also produced some ugly code. There's a better way,
called an action servlet, which implements a concept called Model 2. As far as I
know, this idea was first written about by David M. Geary (see Resources on
page 41 for more from him) but has been used well in popular servlet libraries,
such as the Jakarta Struts project.
In an action servlet, you don't have conditional logic that directs the servlet's
behavior. Instead, you have actions (programmer-defined classes) that the
servlet delegates to in order to handle different types of requests. Most of the
time, that's a much better object-oriented (OO) approach than having multiple
servlets, or multiple if conditions in a single servlet.
What our sample action servlet does

Our sample action servlet will be the gatekeeper for a simplistic browser-based
application that will allow us to create, store, view, and delete contact list
entries. Those entries will be nicely formatted. Eventually, users will have to log
into the application in order to use it, but we'll add that feature later, in Users
and data on page29 .
Setting up the project

Create a new Tomcat project in Eclipse, just like you did for HelloWorld. Note
that the name of your project is the default context value for the servlet, so you'll
use it when we enter the URL that accesses the servlet. If you configured
Tomcat to use context files, it should automatically create one for this project.
Eclipse also should have created a project that has the correct structure, with
the following important directories:
° WEB-INF
° WEB-INF/src

° work
The first directory (WEB-INF) stores important configuration files, specifically

the web.xml file that we'll discuss later. It also contains our compiled code, in
the classes directory. The second directory (WEB-INF/src) stores the source
code for our Java classes. The third directory (work) contains the compiled code
for our JavaServer Pages (JSP) files, which Tomcat creates automatically for us
whenever we hit a JSP page for the first time after code has changed (we'll talk
about JSP technology more on the next panel). The root of the project contains
all of our JSP source files, as well as our database file.
Note that you can see all of this structure in the Resource perspective in
Eclipse, but you'll see only the WEB-INF/src and work directories in the Java
Browsing perspective.
All of these files are contained in the contacts.jar file included with this tutorial
(see Resources on page 41 for a link). To import them, simply create a new
Tomcat project, then import contacts.jar (use the Import>Zip file option). That
will bring all of the files in at the right locations, except the source code. The
source code will end up in the src directory at the root of the project. Move the
contents of that folder to WEB-INF/src and you should be all set.
Presentation
This is a tutorial about servlets, after all, which have almost nothing to do with
presentation. Still, without seeing some results on the screen somewhere, we'd
really be telling only part of the story. You certainly can write servlets that aren't
involved with presentation at all, but most Web apps present information in a
browser, which means that you have to choose a presentation mechanism to
use. JavaServer Pages technology is one typical alternative and is used widely.
With JSP technology, you can create dynamic Web pages. They support static
HTML (or other markup, such as XML) and dynamic code elements that, as the
name implies, can create content dynamically. Under the covers, JSP pages
are compiled into servlets (that is, into Java code) by a container like Tomcat.
You almost never will have to care about that, however. Just know that the
following flow occurs:
° A user types a URL in a browser that the J2EE servlet container points to a
servlet
° The servlet does its job and puts information in the session, or in a bean,
and forwards to the JSP page
° The JSP code translates information in the bean and/or the session, and
sends the response to the browser
You can create simple JSP pages easily and run them in Tomcat with only
minor configuration changes in our Web app and without downloading
additional code libraries, so we'll use them here (see Resources on page 41 for

much more detailed information about JSP technology).
Our Contacts application will have one primary JSP page or listing existing
contacts and adding new ones. Later, we'll add pages for login and logout.
It's important to remember that JSP technology is just one presentation

alternative. There are others. One that is gaining great popularity is the Jakarta
Velocity templating package (see Resources on page 41). JSP technology does
have a major drawback, which is that complicated, feature-rich apps tend to
require ridiculously complex JSP pages, along with some extra server work to
create custom tags if you want to keep your logic and presentation separate.
Another drawback is that JSP technology offers a frequently irresistible
temptation to mix business logic and presentation, which makes for brittle
systems that bring on maintenance nightmares.
In my opinion, JSP technology is frequently the wrong choice, and Velocity (or
some other templating approach) is frequently the right one. But for our simple
example, it will serve the purpose of illustrating the concepts we need to cover.
In such a simple case, mixing a little logic and a little presentation is acceptable.
Professionally, however, it's unwise most of the time, even though many
programmers do it.
The web.xml file

In order for us to use the JSP page we're about to create, we have to tell
Tomcat how to handle it. To do that, we have to create a web.xml file in our
WEB-INF directory. It should look like this:
<!DOCTYPE web-app PUBLIC '-//Sun Microsystems, Inc.//DTD

Web Application 2.3//EN' 'http://java.sun.com/dtd/web-app_2_3.dtd'>
<web-app>
<servlet>
<servlet-name>contacts</servlet-name>
<servlet-class>com.roywmiller.contacts.model2.ContactsServlet</servlet-class>
</servlet>
<servlet-mapping>
<url-pattern>/index.htm</url-pattern>
</servlet-mapping>
<servlet-mapping>
<url-pattern>*.perform</url-pattern>
</servlet-mapping>
<servlet>
<servlet-name>jspAssign</servlet-name>
<servlet-class>org.apache.jasper.servlet.JspServlet</servlet-class>
<init-param>
<param-name>logVerbosityLevel</param-name>
<param-value>WARNING</param-value>

</init-param>
<init-param>
<param-name>fork</param-name>
<param-value>false</param-value>
</init-param>
<load-on-startup>3</load-on-startup>
</servlet>
<servlet-mapping>
<servlet-name>jspAssign</servlet-name>
<url-pattern>/*.jsp</url-pattern>
</servlet-mapping>
</web-app>
We created a basic web.xml file for our HelloWorldServlet, but it was the
pretty minimal. As your application becomes more complex, your web.xml file
has to become more savvy. Let's analyze this file quickly.
The <servlet> tag specifies a name alias for our servlet that we'll use
elsewhere in the file. It also tells Tomcat which class to instantiate so as to
create the servlet in memory. In my Eclipse workspace, I created a
com.roywmiller.contacts.model2 package to hold the servlet class. You
can call your package whatever you want, but the path to your servlet has to
match what's in your <servlet-class> element here. The second servlet we
define is one that comes with Tomcat when you download it, and you don't
need to change it. It's simply the JSP-handling servlet.
The <servlet-mapping> tells Tomcat which servlet to execute when certain

URLs come to the server. We have three mappings here. The first maps the
default page that the Web server looks for (<index.htm>) to our servlet. The
second tells Tomcat to map any URL ending in .perform to our servlet. URLs
of that form will tell our servlet which action to implement (we'll discuss how this
works in more detail later). The third mapping tells Tomcat to use the JSP
servlet to handle JSP pages.
The user view of the JSP page

In our simple example, we're not going to spend much time talking about JSP
technology. That's to ensure that we keep things simple, and don't get bogged
down in the details of presentation generally and JSP technology in particular.
(Again, see Resources on page 41 for more information.) We're also going to
put everything on a single page, at least initially, even though that's somewhat
unrealistic. That should minimize the number of pages we have to create just to
illustrate the important concepts of using servlets.
Our initial page will present the list of contacts, which will come from an object
that contains the list. It will also contain a form for adding a new contact. The
page will look like Figure 5.
Figure 5. ContactList page

While not a work of art, the page displays all of our contacts in nicely formatted
rows at the top. Each one has a Delete link that the user can click on to delete
that particular contact. The form contains fields for name and address values,
and radio buttons for the type of contact (family or acquaintance, in our simple
example). This simple page will allow us to explore how to use a simple action
framework in our servlet application. It also will let us explore how to use the
request and response our servlet receives from the browser during a user
session.
Now we're ready to create the page.
Coding the JSP page

Here's the code for our JSP page:
<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN">

<%@ page import="java.util.*" %>
<%@ page import="com.roywmiller.contacts.model.*" %>
<html>
<head>
<title>Contacts List 1.0</title>
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1">

<style type="text/css">
body, table, hr {
color: black;
background: silver;
font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;
font-size: x-small;
}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<jsp:useBean id="contacts" scope="session"
class="com.roywmiller.contacts.model.ContactList"/>
<h2>Contact List 1.0</h2>

<hr size="2"/>
<table frame="below" width="100%">
<tr>
<th align="left"></th>
<th align="left">Name</th>
<th align="left">Street</th>
<th align="left">City</th>
<th align="left">State</th>
<th align="left">Zip</th>
<th align="left">Type</th>
</tr>
<%
List list = contacts.getContacts();
for (Iterator i = list.iterator(); i.hasNext();) {
Contact contact = (Contact)i.next();
%>
<tr>
<td width="100"><a href="removeContactAction.perform?id=<%= contact.getId()%>"
>Delete</a></td>
<td width="200"><%=contact.getFirstname()%> <%=contact.getLastname()%></td>
<td width="150"><%=contact.getStreet()%></td>
<td width="100"><%=contact.getCity()%></td>
<td width="100"><%=contact.getState()%></td>
<td width="100"><%=contact.getZip()%></td>
<td width="100"><%=contact.getType()%></td>
</tr>
<%
}
%>
</table>
<br/>
<br/>
<br/>
<fieldset>
<legend><b>Add Contact</b></legend>
<form method="post" action="addContactAction.perform">
<table>
<tr>
<td>First Name:<td>
<td><input type="text" size="30" name="firstname"></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>Last Name:<td>
<td><input type="text" size="30" name="lastname"></td>
</tr>
<tr>

<td>Street:<td>
<td><input type="text" size="30" name="street"></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>City:<td>
<td><input type="text" size="30" name="city"></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>State:<td>
<td><input type="text" size="30" name="state"></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>Zip:<td>
<td><input type="text" size="30" name="zip"></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>Type:<td>
<td><input type="radio" size="30" name="type" value="family">
Family <input type="radio" size="30" name="type" value="acquai
checked> Acquaintance</td>
</tr>
</table>
<br/>
<input type="submit" name="addContact" value=" Add ">
</form>
</fieldset>
</body>
</html>
At this point, most of what you see there is probably Greek. We won't dissect all
of it, but over the next few panels we'll hit the high points for understanding how
our servlet will interact with this page.
Anatomy of a simple JSP page

In a JSP page, HTML is HTML. Java code embedded in the page appears like
so:
<% Java code %>
In order to embed Java code in the page, you have to tell the JSP page where
the classes are, just like you do in a Java class. You do that with statements like
this:
<%@ page import="java.util.*" %>
Our page displays a list of contacts, which come from a ContactList instance
that the JSP page knows about because of this line:
<jsp:useBean id="contacts" scope="session" class="com.roywmiller.contacts.model.ContactList"/>

This line tells the JSP page to use a bean, called contacts elsewhere in the
page. It's an instance of
com.roywmiller.contacts.model.ContactList, and it has session
scope.
Notice that we have a Java for loop in the body of the page:
List list = contacts.getContacts();

%>
<tr>
<td width="100">
<a href="removeContactAction.perform?id=<%= contact.getId()%>" >Delete</a></td
<td width="200"><%=contact.getFirstname()%> <%=contact.getLastname()%></td>
<td width="150"><%=contact.getStreet()%></td>
<td width="100"><%=contact.getCity()%></td>
<td width="100"><%=contact.getState()%></td>
<td width="100"><%=contact.getZip()%></td>
<td width="100"><%=contact.getType()%></td>
</tr>
<%
}
This illustrates how JSP technology lets you mix HTML and Java statements.
Here we loop through the contact list of our contact object. Each time through
the loop, we add a <tr> element to our HTML table. Within each row of the
table, one per contact, we call getters on the Contact instance to populate our
table cells. For the first cell, we need to create a Delete link for each row. We
set the href attribute to the following string:
removeContactAction.perform?id=<%= contact.getId()%>
When a user clicks that link, that string will be appended to the end of the URL
that gets sent to the server, after an initial slash (/) is added. The question mark
is a delimiter for request parameters, which follow in name=value pairs. In this
case, we send along the ID of each contact.
This same kind of thing happens elsewhere in the page, such as in the form to
add a new contact. Notice the <form> tag:
When a user clicks the Add button (the submit button at the bottom of the form),
addContactAction.perform gets appended to the URL.
That's all there is to it! Some of this syntactical magic is part of the reason many
professional programmers either begrudgingly use JSP technology, or create
various helper classes (such as custom JSP tags) that help make pages easier
to create, read, and maintain. But now that we have the page, we can get to
writing some code.

Creating the servlet

Our servlet is similar to HelloWorldServlet, with the addition of our action
handling capability:
import java.io.IOException;
import javax.servlet.ServletException;
import javax.servlet.http.HttpServlet;
import javax.servlet.http.HttpServletRequest;
import javax.servlet.http.HttpServletResponse;
import com.roywmiller.contacts.actions.Action;
public class ContactsServlet extends HttpServlet {
protected ActionFactory factory = new ActionFactory();
public ContactsServlet() {
super();
}
protected String getActionName(HttpServletRequest request) {

String path = request.getServletPath();
return path.substring(1, path.lastIndexOf("."));
}
public void service(HttpServletRequest request, HttpServletResponse response) throws

ServletException, IOException {
Action action = factory.create(getActionName(request));
String url = action.perform(request, response);
if (url != null)
getServletContext().getRequestDispatcher(url).forward(request, response);
}
}
We extend HttpServlet and override the service() method, just like

before. In that method, we:
° Derive the action name from the URL that caused the servlet to be invoked
° Instantiate the correct action based on the name
° Tell the action to perform itself
° Forward the response to the URL to which our action points us
We derive the action name from the URL that caused the servlet to be invoked,
which we get from request.servletPath(). Remember that all of the URLs
that cause us to invoke an action will have the form *.perform. We parse that
to get the string to the left of the dot, which is the action name, then pass that
action name to our ActionFactory to instantiate the right action. Now you
see why we told our Web app how to handle URLs of that form, and why we
used those "magic" strings in our JSP page. It was so we could decode them
here and use actions to our advantage. What's the alternative? Lots and lots of

if statements, and lots of extra code. With actions, as we'll see, each action we
need to perform is neatly encapsulated.
This is fine, but we need some additional classes to get the job done. That's
where our action framework comes in.
A simple action framework

Our simple action framework has four main components:
° An ActionFactory. This factory translates action names in requests to

action classes our servlet can use to do work.
° An Action interface. This interface defines the very simple public interface
of all actions.
° An abstract class called ContactsAction. This class implements one

method common to all actions, and forces subclasses to implement the other
(perform()).
° Three subclasses of ContactsAction. These subclasses enable our

servlet to bootstrap itself, add new contacts, and remove contacts.
In the service() method of our servlet, the process begins with

ActionFactory.
The ActionFactory
Here's our ActionFactory:
import java.util.HashMap;
import java.util.Map;
import com.roywmiller.contacts.actions.Action;
import com.roywmiller.contacts.actions.AddContactAction;
import com.roywmiller.contacts.actions.BootstrapAction;
import com.roywmiller.contacts.actions.RemoveContactAction;
public class ActionFactory {

protected Map map = defaultMap();
public ActionFactory() {
super();
}
public Action create(String actionName) {
Class klass = (Class) map.get(actionName);
if (klass == null)

throw new RuntimeException(getClass() + " was unable to find

an action named '" + actionName + "'.");
Action actionInstance = null;

try {
actionInstance = (Action) klass.newInstance();
} catch (Exception e) {
e.printStackTrace();
}
return actionInstance;
}
protected Map defaultMap() {
Map map = new HashMap();
map.put("index", BootstrapAction.class);
map.put("addContactAction", AddContactAction.class);
map.put("removeContactAction", RemoveContactAction.class);
return map;
}
}
An ActionFactory is quite simple. It has a Map of action classes and their

names. We use the names in our pages to tell our servlet which actions to
perform. In our case, we have three actions:
° BootstrapAction
° AddContactAction
° RemoveContactAction
Recall that the actions to add and remove contacts were sent as URLs to our
servlet by the Add form and the Delete link, respectively. The
BootstrapAction simply fits the calling of /index.htm into our action
framework.
When we tell the factory to create an Action, it instantiates the class and gives
us back the instance. Adding a new action to the factory is as simple as creating
the class for the action, then adding a new entry in the factory's action Map.
Actions
The Action interface looks like this:
public interface Action {

public String perform(HttpServletRequest request, HttpServletResponse response);
public void writeToResponseStream(HttpServletResponse response, String output);
}

The method we'll be using extensively now is perform(). The other method,
writeToReponseStream(), allows an action to write directly to the output
stream of the response, for passthrough to the JSP page. Whatever gets written
(text, HTML, etc.) shows up on the page. We won't be using that method for the
moment, but it's available on ContactsAction for you to see how it's done.
Remember that we used the code in the body of this method in our
HelloWorldServlet, so it shouldn't be unfamiliar to you.
Starting up with BootstrapAction

The simplest subclass of ContactsAction we have is BootstrapAction,
and it's a good pattern for the others:
public class BootstrapAction extends ContactsAction {

public String perform(HttpServletRequest request, HttpServletResponse response) {
return "/" + "contactList.jsp";
}
}
We simply implement perform() to do what we want. In this case, all we do is

return a URL that points to contactList.jsp (the initial slash is important, so don't
forget it). Now look back at the service() method on ContactsServlet:
public void service(HttpServletRequest request, HttpServletResponse response)

Action action = factory.create(getActionName(request));
String url = action.perform(request, response);
if (url != null)
getServletContext().getRequestDispatcher(url).forward(request, response);
}
Our action either returns a URL string or writes to the output stream for printing
on the JSP page. If our action returns a URL string, which our
BootstrapAction does, we get the ServletContext, ask it for a
RequestDispatcher on our URL, and finally forward the request and
response to the JSP servlet so it can construct the page. Our action servlet
regains control after that, and can do any remaining work, as long as it doesn't
write to the JSP page's PrintStream, which is now closed.
We could call sendRedirect() on our response if we wanted to, rather than

using a RequestDispatcher:
response.sendRedirect("http://...");
But there's a price to pay for doing that. When we use a dispatcher, we're
delegating the request and response to the JSP servlet, which also forwards

the existing HttpSession. That preserves the contents of the session.

Forwarding to another URL wouldn't. At the moment, when we're displaying the
page initially, there's nothing in the session that we care about, so the effect
would be the same. But very soon it will be important to preserve the session
contents.
To tell our action framework about this new available action, we added this line
to the factory's action Map:
map.put("index", BootstrapAction.class);
Adding contacts
An app that shows a page that doesn't let you do anything isn't very useful. We
need to be able to add contacts.
To do that, we must:
° Create a class called AddContactAction

° Implement perform() to add a new Contact instance to the
ContactList we maintain in our Web session
° Tell the factory about the new action
Telling the factory about the action is as simple as adding another entry in the
factory's map, as we did with BootstrapAction.
The AddContactAction class, with its perform() method implemented,

looks like this:
import javax.servlet.http.HttpSession;
import com.roywmiller.contacts.model.Contact;
import com.roywmiller.contacts.model.ContactList;
public class AddContactAction extends ContactsAction {

Contact newContact = createContact(request);
HttpSession session = request.getSession();

ContactList contacts = (ContactList) session.getAttribute("contacts");
contacts.addContact(newContact);
session.setAttribute("contacts", contacts);
return "/contactList.jsp";
}
protected Contact createContact(HttpServletRequest request) {

Contact contact = new Contact();

contact.setFirstname(request.getParameter(RequestParameters.FIRSTNAME));
contact.setLastname(request.getParameter(RequestParameters.LASTNAME));
contact.setStreet(request.getParameter(RequestParameters.STREET));
contact.setCity(request.getParameter(RequestParameters.CITY));
contact.setState(request.getParameter(RequestParameters.STATE));
contact.setZip(request.getParameter(RequestParameters.ZIP));
contact.setType(request.getParameter(RequestParameters.TYPE));
return contact;
}
}
All we do here is call createContact() to create a new Contact and set its
instance variables to the corresponding values containing the request
parameters. Then we add the new Contact to the ContactList in the
HttpSession. Finally, we tell our servlet to return to /contactList.jsp.
Recall that every time we create a Contact, the constructor assigns it a unique
ID. Look back at the JSP code for a moment. You'll see two important things in
it with regard to what we're doing in this action. First, notice that we guaranteed
we'd always have a ContactList instance in our session by adding this line:
<jsp:useBean id="contacts" scope="session" class="com.roywmiller.contacts.model.ContactList"/>
When the JSP page is first compiled and displayed (as a result of forwarding to
the JSP page after BootstrapAction performs), it will instantiate a
ContactList. This object has nothing in it, which is why our list of contacts
shows up empty when we start the app. In AddContactAction, we're
modifying that object to add new contact information, then reinserting it in the
session. When the page displays after that, it will read the ContactList's list
of Contact instances and display them.
Second, notice that our form to add contacts looks like this:
table with labels and text input fields
<input type="submit" name="addContact" value=" Add ">

</form>
The action for the form causes addContactAction.perform to be sent in

the request to our servlet. It then extracts the addContactAction portion as
the action name, looks it up in the factory, and creates an instance of
AddContactsAction.
Removing contacts
Adding contacts is nice, but being able to remove them is just as important.

Being able to edit them would be nice, but this tutorial is only so long. Besides,
adding edit capability would be as simple as adding another action. So for now,
we'll just add the ability to remove contacts and then move on to more
interesting things.
As before, all we have to do is add a new action class, implement its

perform() method, and tell the factory about it. We also have to be sure that
our JSP code tells our servlet to invoke the action at the right time.
Look at the Delete link for each row of the contacts table in our JSP page:
<a href="removeContactAction.perform?id=<%= contact.getId()%>" >Delete</a>
That link tells our servlet to ask the factory for the right action class for the name
removeContactAction. It also passes a parameter called id in the request,
with a value set to the current contact's ID.
Our class looks like this:
import javax.servlet.http.HttpSession;
import com.roywmiller.contacts.model.ContactList;
public class RemoveContactAction extends ContactsAction {

int contactId = Integer.parseInt(request.getParameter("id"));
HttpSession session = request.getSession();

ContactList contacts = (ContactList) session.getAttribute("contacts");
contacts.removeContact(contactId);
session.setAttribute("contacts", contacts);
}
}
All we do here is grab the id parameter and the ContactList from the
session, tell the list to remove the Contact with that id, then replace the list on
the session. Last, but not least, we tell the servlet to forward back to
contactList.jsp.
Running the app

If curiosity hasn't gotten the better of you already, you should now run the app
to see how it works.
Launch a browser and enter the following URL:

http://localhost:8080/contacts/
If Tomcat works its magic correctly, you should be looking at contactList.jsp,

with no contacts in the list. Type in some values for the text fields on the add
form and click the Add button. You should see a new contact in the list,
complete with a Delete link to the left of the contact's name. Unless you
changed it, its type should be set to Acquaintance (the default radio button
selection for type). To keep things simple, we didn't do any validation of the
form, so you can enter multiple contacts with exactly the same values for all
fields. Each contact has a unique ID, so each one will show up separately, and
you can delete them individually.
That's it -- we have a working Web application! But we can't save our list of
contacts, so we have to reenter them every time we launch the app. Worse,
every user of our app has the same list of contacts. We can fix that by adding
support for unique users, and by storing data in a file (the simplest database
that could possibly work). We'll do both in the next section.

Section 5. Users and data
Enhancing the app

In this section, we're going to refactor our code and our existing JSP page
somewhat to handle persistent contact data for unique users. In a nutshell, we'll
do the following:
° Create a ContactsUser object
° Give each ContactsUser a username, password, and contact list
° Change our JSP page's <jsp:useBean/> tag to use a ContactsUser
° Add login.jsp as the first page of the app
° Change contactList.jsp to include a friendly welcome message for the

logged-in user
° Add a Logout link to contactList.jsp to invoke LogoutAction
° Add a goodbye.jsp to display a personalized goodbye message
° Add a LoginAction and a LogoutAction
° Add a UsersDatabase to handle storing and retrieving Contacts from

usersDatabase.txt
° Initialize the ContactsDatabase by overriding init() on our servlet
° Override destroy() on our servlet to tell UsersDatabase to close

usersDatabase.txt
Not so bad, really. The only real new concepts are using files (just more
standard Java language work) and directing to new pages. All of the action
handling mechanisms are the same. This will illustrate the power of our action
framework, which took precious little time to create. And it isn't nearly as
complicated as something like Jakarta's Struts framework (see Resources on
page 41), which just might be overkill for what you're doing in your application.
The ContactsUser

Our ContactsUser object looks like this, minus the import statements and
accessors (you can find the complete source code in contacts.jar):
public class ContactsUser {
protected String username = "";

protected String password = "";
protected List contactList = new ArrayList();
public ContactsUser() {
}
public ContactsUser(String username, String password, List contactList) {

this.username = username;
this.password = password;
this.contactList.addAll(contactList);
}
public boolean hasContacts() {

return !contactList.isEmpty();
}
public void addContact(Contact aContact) {

contactList.add(aContact);
}
public void removeContact(Contact aContact) {

contactList.remove(aContact);
}
public void removeContact(int id) {

Contact toRemove = findContact(id);
contactList.remove(toRemove);
}
protected Contact findContact(int id) {

Contact found = null;
Iterator iterator = contactList.iterator();

while (iterator.hasNext()) {
Contact current = (Contact) iterator.next();
if (current.getId() == id)
found = current;
}
return found;
}
accessors...
}
This class holds information about users of the application. For the most part,
that's all it does. It holds the user's username and password, and maintains a
list of contacts for the user. It allows various actions in our action framework to
add Contacts to the user, and remove them. The no-argument constructor is
there for unit testing purposes. The other constructor, the one that takes three
arguments, is the one the app uses.
You might be asking yourself, "Why doesn't this class have a ContactList
instance variable?" After all, we went to the trouble of creating it in the first

place. Why don't we use it? The simple answer is that we really don't need that
class anymore. It wrapped an ArrayList and gave us some helper methods.
Those helper methods really make more sense on ContactUser. If we used a
ContactList, we'd be calling methods on it from ContactUser that have the
same names, and that we want to accomplish the same thing. For example, if
ContactUser had a ContactList, and we named that instance variable
contactList, here's what addContact() would look like:
public void addContact(Contact aContact) {

contactList.addContact(aContact);
}
Delegating to that other object here is a little silly. So we deleted the

ContactList class. That's what refactoring is all about. We simplified our
code, and reduced the number of classes in our system, but still got the same
job done. Having ContactList was an intermediate step in creating our
system. It let us get up and running, and helped us create our action framework.
Then its useful life ended and we got rid of it. Just because you wrote some
code doesn't mean you have to keep it around forever.
Changing contactList.jsp
Changing the JSP page to use our new ContactUser is straightforward. There
are three changes we need to make.
The first is to change the <jsp:useBean> tag to look like this:
<jsp:useBean id="user" scope="session" class="com.roywmiller.contacts.model.ContactsUser"/>
Now our page will instantiate a ContactsUser instead of a ContactList.
The second change is to update the table row-building logic in the page to use
our new user variable:
<%
List list = user.getContacts();
%>
The third change is to add a link for a user to log out:
<a href="logoutAction.perform">Logout</a>
We'll put this link next to the "Contacts 1.0" header. When a user clicks the link,
our servlet will perform the LogoutAction.

Adding the login/logout pages

Compared to our other pages, the ones to support logging in and logging out
are simple. The only differences exist within the <body> tag. Here's login.jsp:
<body>
<hr size="2"/>
<fieldset>
<legend><b>Please Login</b></legend>
<form method="post" action="loginAction.perform">
<table>
<tr>
<td>Username:<td>
<td><input type="text" size="30" name="username"></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>Password:<td>
<td><input type="text" size="30" name="password"></td>
</tr>
</table>
<br/>
<input type="submit" name="login" value=" Login ">
</form>
</fieldset>
</body>
This page has a form with two text fields and a submit button. When a user
clicks Login, our servlet will perform the LoginAction.
Here's goodbye.jsp:
<body>
<jsp:useBean id="user" scope="session" class="com.roywmiller.contacts.model.ContactsUser"/>

<hr size="2"/>
Goodbye <%= user.getUsername() %>!
</body>
This page calls getUsername() on a ContactsUser bean to display a

personalized goodbye message.
When a user tries to log in with a username and password that aren't in our
database, our application gives up and routes the user to an error page, which
looks like this:
<body>
<hr size="2"/>
<fieldset>

<legend><b>Error</b></legend>
There was an error: <%= session.getAttribute("errorMessage") %>
</fieldset>
</body>
This is the simplest page we have. It uses the default session variable
available in all JSP pages to display an error message.
Adding LoginAction
The LoginAction class looks like this:
public class LoginAction implements Action {

String username = request.getParameter(USERNAME);
String password = request.getParameter(PASSWORD);
ContactsUser user = UserDatabase.getSingleton().get(username, password);

if (user != null) {
ContactsUser contactsUser = (ContactsUser) user;
request.getSession().setAttribute("user", contactsUser);
} else
request.getSession().setAttribute("errorMessage", "Invalid username/password.");
return "/error.jsp";
}
This action grabs the username and password parameters from the request,
then checks to see if our database contains a user with that
username/password combination. If it does, we put the user in the session and
go directly to contactList.jsp. If that user doesn't exist in our database, we set an
error message on the session and go to error.jsp.
Adding actions should be easy for us now. We add an entry to our action factory
that looks like this:
map.put("loginAction", LoginAction.class);
With the pages in place, and our factory aware of our new action, we're done.
You should be able to run the app and see the login page. When you enter a
username and password, regardless of what they are, you should see the error
page. In just a little while, you'll be able to log in with a valid username and
password, and see contactList.jsp with an empty contact list.
Adding LogoutAction
The LogoutAction class looks like this:
public class LogoutAction implements Action {

UserDatabase.getSingleton().shutDown();
return "/goodbye.jsp";
}
Here we tell our database to shutDown(). That method on UserDatabase

looks like this:
public void shutDown() {

writeUsers();
}
protected void writeUsers() {

StringBuffer buffer = new StringBuffer();
Collection allUsers = users.values();
Iterator iterator = allUsers.iterator();
while (iterator.hasNext()) {
ContactsUser each = (ContactsUser) iterator.next();
UserRecord record = new UserRecord(each);
buffer.append(record.getFullRecord());
}
writeText(buffer.toString());
}
protected synchronized void writeText(String text) {

Writer writer = null;
try {
writer = new FileWriter(usersFile.getAbsolutePath());
writer.write(text);
throw new RuntimeException("Unable to append to file.", e);
} finally {
closeWriter(writer);
}
}
shutDown() calls writeUsers(), which iterates over all the users we have in
memory (from when we read in the file when the servlet initialized itself),
creates a UserRecord for each, then passes the complete string to
writeText(). That method dumps the string to the file, overwriting the
existing contents. The UserRecord class is a nice helper that encapsulates all
of the somewhat messy tokenizing work for each user record in the file. You can
examine the code for yourself (see contacts.jar for the complete source code
listing).
Once the database is shut down, we tell the servlet to forward to goodbye.jsp to
display our personalized goodbye.

The userDatabase.txt file

Most Web applications access data from a "database" of some kind. Many use
an industrial-strength RDBMS, but a text file can be a database also. It's the
simplest database that could possibly work. If you wrap it well, and hide the
access details behind an interface that makes accessing the data reasonably
painless for other classes in your app, the form of the underlying data store
really doesn't matter.
In our application, we'll use a text file. That file will contain a single line per user,
in the following form:
username password comma-delimited contact1 info|comma-delimited contactN info|...
The usernames in our file will be plain text, but the passwords will be Base64
encoded for (arguably too-simple) security. The entries for contacts will be
comma-delimited within each. The contacts themselves will be delimited by pipe
characters (|). There's no magic to this formatting. It just does what we need it
to do, which is to allow us to parse the file easily.
For convenience, we'll put this file at the root of our project so that the path to
the file is straightforward.
To keep things simple, our application doesn't support user maintenance

features, which means that there's no way to add or remove a user from within
the app. That means that you have to add users to userDatabase.txt manually.
For example, to add a user named testuser with the password password,
add the following line to the file:
testuser cGFzc3dvcmQ=
The password in each entry is encoded with Base64 encoding. You can use the
EncoderDecoder class in contacts.jar to figure out the encoded version of
your password. Its main() method lets you enter a plaintext string, then run the
class to print the encoded password to the console.
The UserDatabase
Our UserDatabase wraps interaction with our text file. The class listing looks
large, but it's not complicated (much of the perceived complexity is the extra
Java coding stuff you need to deal with reading and writing files). We'll discuss
a few high points in this panel (see contacts.jar for the complete code listing).
The class implements the Singleton pattern. The class maintains a single
instance that all users share by calling getSingleton().

The class maintains a Map of ContactsUsers, with the concatenated

username and password acting as the key for each entry. Anything could serve
as the key, but this was convenient.
In our servlet init() method, we'll tell the UserDatabase where the
database file is located (based on the ServletContext), then we'll tell it to
initialize itself by calling initialize(). That method looks like this:
public void initialize() {

usersFile = new File(databaseFilePathname);
String allUsers = retrieveText();

StringTokenizer tokenizer = new StringTokenizer(allUsers, "\n");
while (tokenizer.hasMoreTokens()) {
String userEntry = tokenizer.nextToken();
UserRecord record = new UserRecord(userEntry);
put(new ContactsUser(record.getName(), record.getPassword(), record.getContactList())
}
}
This method reads in the complete file by calling retrieveText, tokenizes the
big string, creates a UserRecord for each user, then calls put() to place the
new ContactsUser in the map. The real work of this method goes on in the
calls to retrieveText() and put():
protected synchronized String retrieveText() {

BufferedReader bufferedReader = null;
try {
bufferedReader = new BufferedReader(new FileReader(usersFile.getAbsolutePath()));
char charBuff[] = new char[(int) new File(usersFile.getAbsolutePath()).length()];
bufferedReader.read(charBuff);
return new String(charBuff);
throw new RuntimeException("Unable to read in the file.", e);
} finally {
closeReader(bufferedReader);
}
}
protected void closeReader(BufferedReader bufferedReader) {

try {
if (bufferedReader != null)
bufferedReader.close();
} catch (Exception ex) {}
}
public void put(ContactsUser user) {

String userKey = user.getUsername() + user.getPassword();
users.put(userKey, user);
}
The retrieveText() method does the file reading work. It creates a

BufferedReader to read the entire file contents into a character buffer, which
is then turned into a String. In its finally clause, it calls closeReader()
to do just that. The writeText() method writes output to the file, overwriting

its existing contents. The method hides the same kind of file interaction details.
The put() method creates the key for the user (the username plus the
password) and inserts it in the map of users.

Section 6. Using servlets effectively
Introduction
In this tutorial, we've only scratched the surface of what you can do with
servlets. Web apps can be as sophisticated as you can imagine. The underlying
mechanisms, though, are essentially the same for all of them, and if you're
writing code in the Java language, servlets are at the core. Creating more
sophisticated apps is a matter of using more sophisticated tools and libraries.
However, that's where many programmers make mistakes that lead them to
create terrible Web applications. This section contains some suggestions on
how to avoid that. Most Java programmers with Web development experience
would agree with some of these. Some are more controversial. In any case,
they should help get you started with servlets well.
Use a single servlet

If you can't use just one servlet, use as few as possible. In fact, I suggest that
you use one until you absolutely can't anymore. You don't need a hundred
servlets. You certainly don't need one for each type of request.
Don't hang around the servlet

Spend as little time in your servlet as possible.
Servlets aren't a place for business logic. That's bad OOP design. Think of a
servlet as one of two things:
° An extra layer behind your UI that helps get "events" to the server
° An extra layer in front of the server that allows you to use a browser as your
UI
Either way, it's a place where you quickly dispatch matters to other pieces of
your application, then get out.
Use actions
An action framework, even a simple one like the one we used in this tutorial, is

a powerful approach. It allows you to follow my previous bit of advice: to spend

as little time in your servlet as possible. It's also good OOP design. Each action
class does one thing, or a very cohesive set of related things.
Some people think this fragments the code, making it more difficult to
understand. I think that this objection stems from two things:
° People aren't used to looking at object-oriented code, which certainly can

feel more fragmented when you first start looking at it
° People favor more procedural code, even in an object
Think about the alternative. Without actions (assuming you don't simply
delegate to other objects that you don't call "actions"), you'll have to have lots of
if statements. If you have two or three, your code will be reasonably easy to
read. If you have ten, that's silly. A method that requires you to scroll through
several screens is bad news. It usually means that the method does too much.
At minimum, you should extract the action-like things you do in service() (or
doGet(), etc.) into other methods that are named well so you know what they
do.
Use actions. When you need to add features, add actions.
Use service(), unless you can't

There are many folks in the servlet world who claim that you shouldn't override
service(). Instead, they say, you should override doGet() and/or
doPost(), possibly having them call each other, making your code look
something like this:
public void doGet(HttpServletRequest request, HttpServletResponse response)

statements
}
public void doPost(HttpServletRequest request, HttpServletResponse response)

doGet(request, response);
}
I don't know where these ideas come from. Bruce Eckle suggests that it's a
holdover from the CGI days, when folks grew used to paying attention to
whether a GET or POST was coming in. (See Resources on page 41 for a link to
a more detailed version of his theory.) I've never heard a good reason not to
use service(). In any case, if you use it, and then determine later that it
would be better to use one of the doX() flavors, refactor the code! Until then,
use service(), because it's easier.

Don't mix presentation and business logic

Generating complex HTML strings to spit out to the JSP page's print stream is
fine for a simple app, but creating a more feature-rich app that way is more
painful than it needs to be.
It's wiser to keep presentation in the place where it belongs: in the page. JSP
technology allows you to do that, but as I said earlier, it requires a lot more work
to keep business logic and presentation separate. Templating engines like
Velocity are often a better choice. Whatever approach you choose, minimize the
mixing of business logic and presentation.
Handle exceptions well

We didn't talk about this much in this tutorial, but handling exceptions becomes
important when you're creating a Web app. There is nothing more frustrating to
the user than having something unexpected happen on the server side, and
then seeing a cryptic stack trace in your browser. Some of those traces can be
disgustingly obtuse, and obscure. Tracking them down can be frustrating.
Many of the packaged Web app development libraries, like Struts (see
Resources on page 41), come with built-in frameworks for handling dynamic
display of messages, including errors. Use those features.
Don't use every feature

Do you need to use every single feature of the Web app development
framework or library you're using? Probably not, and using every one can make
your code much more complex than it needs to be. In fact, I recommend that
you not start with a framework at all, except the simplest one that could possibly
work. Sometimes that feature or framework you "know" you'll be using or need
to use ends up being extreme overkill for the problem at hand.
Use a framework when it's wise to use one. Don't assume that you need it. Wait
for your system to tell you that you do. Some programmers consider that "bad
design." Not so. Assuming you'll need a particular framework, or even a
particular feature of that framework, can be overdesign. You should design for
what you need; most often, that changes as the system grows. It's frustrating to
pick a framework before development begins, then hit a brick wall because that
framework doesn't support or allow something you want to do.

Section 7. Wrap-up and resources
Summary
In this tutorial, you've learned about Java servlets, and how to use them
professionally. Certainly the examples in this tutorial are simple, but they
illustrate most of the servlet concepts you would use to create a Web
application. There are more features (configuration and otherwise) available to
you, but the core of almost every Web app written with the Java language is
one or more servlets acting as gatekeepers for business logic on one or more
servers behind the scenes.
More importantly, you've learned some techniques for using servlets well. Web
applications often grow into messy piles of code. By using some simple
techniques driven by fundamental OOP principles, you can avoid the mess, and
create apps that are a joy to enhance and maintain.
Resources
° Download the contacts.jar that accompanies this tutorial.
° Download Tomcat (http://jakarta.apache.org/tomcat/index.html) from the

Apache Jakarta Project (http://jakarta.apache.org) .
° You'll also need the Tomcat plug-in for Eclipse

(http://www.sysdeo.com/eclipse/tomcatPlugin.html) from Sysdeo. Once
you've installed it, check out the HelloWorld servlet setup "tutorial" from
Sysdeo.
° David Geary's Advanced JavaServer Pages (Pearson Higher Education,

2001) is a must-read.
° If your Web application is too complex for simple JSP components, you may
wish to investigate the Velocity Template Engine
(http://jakarta.apache.org/velocity/) or the Struts Web Application Framework
(http://struts.apache.org/) . Both projects are hosted by the Apache
Foundation.
° The Java Technology home page (http://java.sun.com) is the "official" Java

language resource. The Java Servlet Technology
(http://java.sun.com/products/servlet/index.jsp) section of the site offers a
wealth of information on programming with servlets.
° The Java tutorial (http://java.sun.com/docs/books/tutorial/index.html) from

Sun is an excellent resource. There is a "trail" for servlets.
° The developerWorks New to Java technology page

(http://www-106.ibm.com/developerworks/java/newto/) is a clearinghouse for
developerWorks resources for beginning Java developers, including links to
tutorials and certification resources.
° The developerWorks Technology library has links to developerWorks Java

learning resources, including additional tutorials like this one and Java
articles.
° Bruce Eckle speculates (http://www.cs.hut.fi/Docs/Eckel/TIJ3ed/TIJ320.htm)

on historical reasons why many Web programmers are reluctant to override
service().
° You'll find articles about every aspect of Java programming in the

developerWorks Java technology zone
(http://www-136.ibm.com/developerworks/java/) .
° Visit the Developer Bookstore (http://devworks.krcinfo.com/) for a

comprehensive listing of technical books, including hundreds of Java-related
titles.
° Also see the Java technology zone tutorials page for a complete listing of
free Java-focused tutorials from developerWorks.
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Introduction to Java Servlet technology

Presented by developerWorks, your source for great tutorials

1. Before you start ................................................................................... 2

Introduction to Java Servlet technology Page 1 of 42

Section 1. Before you start

About this tutorial

Should I take this tutorial?

You should, however, have the fundamentals of Java programming well in

Tools and code

Page 2 of 42 Introduction to Java Servlet technology

About the author

Introduction to Java Servlet technology Page 3 of 42

Section 2. An introduction to servlets

What does a servlet do?

° They're as platform independent as the Java language

Servlets are a powerful addition to the professional programmer's toolbox.

But what is a servlet?

Page 4 of 42 Introduction to Java Servlet technology

designed to respond to HTTP requests in the context of a Web application. As

The HTTP protocol isn't Java-specific, of course. It is simply a specification that

° The container calls init() on the servlet.

° The container calls service() on the servlet, and passes in a wrapped

Introduction to Java Servlet technology Page 5 of 42

° The servlet typically accesses elements in the request, delegates to other

How do you "run" a servlet?

Unfortunately, something does go wrong frustratingly often, especially when

Page 6 of 42 Introduction to Java Servlet technology

Section 3. A simple servlet

What our simple servlet does

Figure 1. Tomcat plugin features

Introduction to Java Servlet technology Page 7 of 42

Figure 2. Tomcat preferences

Creating a Tomcat project

Page 8 of 42 Introduction to Java Servlet technology

Figure 3. New Tomcat project

Figure 4. Tomcat project structure

Introduction to Java Servlet technology Page 9 of 42

The work, WEB-INF, and WEB-INF/src directories are particularly important, as

Declaring the class

public class HelloWorldServlet extends HttpServlet {

public void service(HttpServletRequest request, HttpServletResponse response)

Page 10 of 42 Introduction to Java Servlet technology

throws ServletException, IOException {

Notice that we subclassed HttpServlet, and that we overrode the

In our service() method, we called getWriter() on our response

Configuring the Web application

Introduction to Java Servlet technology Page 11 of 42

<Context path="/HelloWorld" reloadable="true" docBase="path to your project\HelloWorld"

<!DOCTYPE web-app PUBLIC '-//Sun Microsystems, Inc.//DTD

Running the servlet

You should see a nice message in your browser window.

Page 12 of 42 Introduction to Java Servlet technology

Section 4. Action servlets

That quickly became painful, so programmers started to include conditional

What our sample action servlet does

Setting up the project

Introduction to Java Servlet technology Page 13 of 42

The first directory (WEB-INF) stores important configuration files, specifically

Page 14 of 42 Introduction to Java Servlet technology

much more detailed information about JSP technology).

It's important to remember that JSP technology is just one presentation

The web.xml file