JSP

JSP interview questions

1. What is JSP? Describe its concept. JSP is a technology that combines HTML/XML
markup languages and elements of Java programming Language to return dynamic
content to the Web client, It is normally used to handle Presentation logic of a web
application, although it may have business logic.
2. What are the lifecycle phases of a JSP?
JSP page looks like a HTML page but is a servlet. When presented with JSP page the JSP
engine does the following 7 phases.
1. Page translation: -page is parsed, and a java file which is a servlet is created.
2. Page compilation: page is compiled into a class file
3. Page loading : This class file is loaded.
4. Create an instance :- Instance of servlet is created
5. jspInit() method is called
6. _jspService is called to handle service calls
7. _jspDestroy is called to destroy it when the servlet is not required.
3. What is a translation unit? JSP page can include the contents of other HTML pages or
other JSP files. This is done by using the include directive. When the JSP engine is
presented with such a JSP page it is converted to one servlet class and this is called a
translation unit, Things to remember in a translation unit is that page directives affect the
whole unit, one variable declaration cannot occur in the same unit more than once, the
standard action jsp:useBean cannot declare the same bean twice in one unit.
4. How is JSP used in the MVC model? JSP is usually used for presentation in the MVC
pattern (Model View Controller ) i.e. it plays the role of the view. The controller deals
with calling the model and the business classes which in turn get the data, this data is then
presented to the JSP for rendering on to the client.
5. What are context initialization parameters? Context initialization parameters are
specified by the <context-param> in the web.xml file, these are initialization parameter
for the whole application and not specific to any servlet or JSP.
6. What is a output comment? A comment that is sent to the client in the viewable page
source. The JSP engine handles an output comment as un-interpreted HTML text,
returning the comment in the HTML output sent to the client. You can see the comment
by viewing the page source from your Web browser.
7. What is a Hidden Comment? A comment that documents the JSP page but is not sent to
the client. The JSP engine ignores a hidden comment, and does not process any code
within hidden comment tags. A hidden comment is not sent to the client, either in the
displayed JSP page or the HTML page source. The hidden comment is useful when you
want to hide or “comment out” part of your JSP page.
8. What is a Expression? Expressions are act as place holders for language expression,
expression is evaluated each time the page is accessed.
9. What is a Declaration? It declares one or more variables or methods for use later in the
JSP source file. A declaration must contain at least one complete declarative statement.
You can declare any number of variables or methods within one declaration tag, as long
as semicolons separate them. The declaration must be valid in the scripting language used
in the JSP file.
10. What is a Scriptlet? A scriptlet can contain any number of language statements, variable
or method declarations, or expressions that are valid in the page scripting language.
 Within scriptlet tags, you can declare variables or methods to use later in the file, write
expressions valid in the page scripting language, use any of the JSP implicit objects or
any object declared with a <jsp:useBean>.
11. What are the implicit objects? List them. Certain objects that are available for the use
in JSP documents without being declared first. These objects are parsed by the JSP engine
and inserted into the generated servlet. The implicit objects are:

o request
o response
o pageContext
o session
o application
o out
o config
o page
o exception
2. What’s the difference between forward and
sendRedirect? When you invoke a forward request, the
request is sent to another resource on the server,
without the client being informed that a different
resource is going to process the request. This process
occurs completely with in the web container And then
returns to the calling method. When a sendRedirect
method is invoked, it causes the web container to return
to the browser indicating that a new URL should be
requested. Because the browser issues a completely
new request any object that are stored as request
attributes before the redirect occurs will be lost. This
extra round trip a redirect is slower than forward.
3. What are the different scope values for the <jsp:useBean>? The different
scope values for <jsp:useBean> are:
o page
o request
o session
o application
4. Why are JSP pages the preferred API for creating a web-based client
program? Because no plug-ins or security policy files are needed on the client
systems(applet does). Also, JSP pages enable cleaner and more module
application design because they provide a way to separate applications
programming from web page design. This means personnel involved in web page
design do not need to understand Java programming language syntax to do their
jobs.
 5. Is JSP technology extensible? Yes, it is. JSP technology is extensible through
the development of custom actions, or tags, which are encapsulated in tag
libraries.
6. What is difference between custom JSP tags and beans? Custom JSP tag is a
tag you defined. You define how a tag, its attributes and its body are interpreted,
and then group your tags into collections called tag libraries that can be used in
any number of JSP files. Custom tags and beans accomplish the same goals –
encapsulating complex behavior into simple and accessible forms. There are
several differences:
o Custom tags can manipulate JSP content; beans cannot.
o Complex operations can be reduced to a significantly simpler form with custom
tags than with beans.
o Custom tags require quite a bit more work to set up than do beans.
o Custom tags usually define relatively self-contained behavior, whereas beans are
often defined in one servlet and used in a different servlet or JSP page.
o Custom tags are available only in JSP 1.1 and later, but beans can be used in all
JSP 1.x versions.

Question Can we implement an interface in a JSP? (JSP)

Answer No
Question What is the difference between ServletContext and PageContext? (JSP)
ServletContext: Gives the information about the container
Answer
PageContext: Gives the information about the Request
What is the difference in using request.getRequestDispatcher() and
Question
context.getRequestDispatcher()? (JSP)
request.getRequestDispatcher(path): In order to create it we need to give
the relative path of the resource
Answer
context.getRequestDispatcher(path): In order to create it we need to give
the absolute path of the resource.
Question How to pass information from JSP to included JSP? (JSP)
Answer Using <%jsp:param> tag.
Question What is the difference between directive include and jsp include? (JSP)
<%@ include> : Used to include static resources during translation time.
Answer
: Used to include dynamic content or static content during runtime.
Question What is the difference between RequestDispatcher and sendRedirect? (JSP)
RequestDispatcher: server-side redirect with request and response objects.
Answer
sendRedirect : Client-side redirect with new request and response objects.
Question How does JSP handle runtime exceptions? (JSP)
Using errorPage attribute of page directive and also we need to specify
Answer
isErrorPage=true if the current page is intended to URL redirecting of a JSP.
Question How do you delete a Cookie within a JSP? (JSP)

Cookie mycook = new Cookie("name","value"); response.addCookie(mycook); Cookie

Answer
killmycook = new Cookie("mycook","value"); killmycook.setMaxAge(0);
killmycook.setPath("/"); killmycook.addCookie(killmycook);
Question How do I mix JSP and SSI #include? (JSP)
If you're just including raw HTML, use the #include directive as usual inside your .jsp
file.
<!--#include file="data.inc"-->
But it's a little trickier if you want the server to evaluate any JSP code that's inside the
Answer
included file. Ronel Sumibcay ([email protected]) says: If your data.inc
file contains jsp code you will have to use
<%@ vinclude="data.inc" %>
The <!--#include file="data.inc"--> is used for including non-JSP files.
Question How can my application get to know when a HttpSession is removed? (JSP)
Define a Class HttpSessionNotifier which implements HttpSessionBindingListener
Answer and implement the functionality what you need in valueUnbound() method.
Create an instance of that class and put that instance in HttpSession.
Question How can I implement a thread-safe JSP page? (JSP)
You can make your JSPs thread-safe by having them implement the
Answer SingleThreadModel interface. This is done by adding the directive <%@ page
isThreadSafe="false" % > within your JSP page.
Question How many JSP scripting elements are there and what are they? (JSP)
There are three scripting language elements:
declarations
Answer
scriptlets
expressions
In the Servlet 2.4 specification SingleThreadModel has been deprecates,
Question
why? (JSP)
Because it is not practical to have such model. Whether you set
isThreadSafe to true or false, you should take care of concurrent client
Answer
requests to the JSP page by synchronizing access to any shared objects
defined at the page level.
Question How do I include static files within a JSP page? (JSP)
Static resources should always be included using the JSP include directive. This way,
the inclusion is performed just once during the translation phase. The following
Answer example shows the syntax: Do note that you should always supply a relative URL for
the file attribute. Although you can also include static resources using the action, this is
not advisable as the inclusion is then performed for each and every request.
Question How do I mix JSP and SSI #include? (JSP)
If you're just including raw HTML, use the #include directive as usual inside your .jsp
file.
<!--#include file="data.inc"-->
Answer But it's a little trickier if you want the server to evaluate any JSP code that's inside the
included file. If your data.inc file contains jsp code you will have to use
<%@ vinclude="data.inc" %>
The <!--#include file="data.inc"--> is used for including non-JSP files.
Question Can a JSP page process HTML FORM data? (JSP)
Answer Yes. However, unlike servlets, you are not required to implement HTTP-protocol
specific methods like doGet() or doPost() within your JSP page. You can obtain the data
for the FORM input elements via the request implicit object within a scriptlet or
 expression as:
<%
String item = request.getParameter("item");
int howMany = new Integer(request.getParameter("units")).intValue();
%>
or
<%= request.getParameter("item") %>
Question What JSP lifecycle methods can I override? (JSP)
You cannot override the _jspService() method within a JSP page. You can however,
override the jspInit() and jspDestroy() methods within a JSP page. jspInit() can be
useful for allocating resources like database connections, network connections, and so
forth for the JSP page. It is good programming practice to free any allocated resources
within jspDestroy().
The jspInit() and jspDestroy() methods are each executed just once during the lifecycle
of a JSP page and are typically declared as JSP declarations:
<%!
public void jspInit() {
Answer
...
}
%>

<%!
public void jspDestroy() {
...
}
%>
Question How do I include static files within a JSP page? (JSP)
Static resources should always be included using the JSP include directive. This way,
the inclusion is performed just once during the translation phase. The following
example shows the syntax:
Answer <%@ include file="copyright.html" %>
Do note that you should always supply a relative URL for the file attribute. Although
you can also include static resources using the action, this is not advisable as the
inclusion is then performed for each and every request.
Question How do I perform browser redirection from a JSP page? (JSP)
Answer You can use the response implicit object to redirect the browser to a different resource,
as:
response.sendRedirect("http://www.foo.com/path/error.html");
You can also physically alter the Location HTTP header attribute, as shown below:
<%
response.setStatus(HttpServletResponse.SC_MOVED_PERMANENTLY);
String newLocn = "/newpath/index.html";
response.setHeader("Location",newLocn);
%>
You can also use the: <jsp:forward page="/newpage.jsp" /> Also note that you can only
use this before any output has been sent to the client. I beleve this is the case with the
response.sendRedirect() method as well.
If you want to pass any paramateres then you can pass using <jsp:forward
page="/servlet/login"> <jsp:param name="username" value="jsmith" />
 </jsp:forward>>
Question Can a JSP page instantiate a serialized bean? (JSP)
No problem! The useBean action specifies the beanName attribute, which can be used
for indicating a serialized bean. For example:
<jsp:useBean id="shop" type="shopping.CD" beanName="CD" /> <jsp:getProperty
name="shop" property="album" />
Answer
A couple of important points to note. Although you would have to name your serialized
file "filename.ser", you only indicate "filename" as the value for the beanName
attribute. Also, you will have to place your serialized file within the WEB-
INF\jsp\beans directory for it to be located by the JSP engine.
Question Can you make use of a ServletOutputStream object from within a JSP page? (JSP)
No. You are supposed to make use of only a JSPWriter object (given to you in the
form of the implicit object out) for replying to clients. A JSPWriter can be viewed as a
buffered version of the stream object returned by response.getWriter(), although from
Answer
an implementational perspective, it is not. A page author can always disable the default
buffering for any page using a page directive as:
<%@ page buffer="none" %>
What's a better approach for enabling thread-safe servlets and JSPs?
Question
SingleThreadModel Interface or Synchronization? (JSP)
Although the SingleThreadModel technique is easy to use, and works well for low
volume sites, it does not scale well. If you anticipate your users to increase in the
future, you may be better off implementing explicit synchronization for your shared
data. The key however, is to effectively minimize the amount of code that is
synchronzied so that you take maximum advantage of multithreading.
Answer Also, note that SingleThreadModel is pretty resource intensive from the server's
perspective. The most serious issue however is when the number of concurrent requests
exhaust the servlet instance pool. In that case, all the unserviced requests are queued
until something becomes free - which results in poor performance. Since the usage is
non-deterministic, it may not help much even if you did add more memory and
increased the size of the instance pool.
Question Can I stop JSP execution while in the midst of processing a request? (JSP)
Yes. Preemptive termination of request processing on an error condition is
a good way to maximize the throughput of a high-volume JSP engine. The
trick (asuming Java is your scripting language) is to use the return
statement when you want to terminate further processing. For example,
consider:
<% if (request.getParameter("foo") != null) {
// generate some html or update bean property
} else {
Answer
/* output some error message or provide redirection back to the input form
after creating a memento bean updated with the 'valid' form elements that
were input. this bean can now be used by the previous form to initialize the
input elements that were valid then, return from the body of the
_jspService() method to terminate further processing */
return;
}
%>
Question How can I get to view any compilation/parsing errors at the client while developing
 JSP pages? (JSP)
With JSWDK 1.0, set the following servlet initialization property within the \WEB-
INF\servlets.properties file for your application:
Answer jsp.initparams=sendErrToClient=true
This will cause any compilation/parsing errors to be sent as part of the response to the
client.
Question Is there a way to reference the "this" variable within a JSP page? (JSP)
Yes, there is. Under JSP 1.0, the page implicit object is equivalent to "this", and
Answer
returns a reference to the servlet generated by the JSP page.
How do I instantiate a bean whose constructor accepts parameters using the useBean
Question
tag? (JSP)
Consider the following bean: package bar;
public class FooBean {
public FooBean(SomeObj arg) {
...
}
//getters and setters here
}
The only way you can instantiate this bean within your JSP page is to use a scriptlet.
For example, the following snippet creates the bean with session scope:
&l;% SomeObj x = new SomeObj(...);
bar.FooBean foobar = new FooBean(x);
session.putValue("foobar",foobar);
%> You can now access this bean within any other page that is part of the same session
as: &l;%
bar.FooBean foobar = session.getValue("foobar");
Answer
%>
To give the bean "application scope", you will have to place it within the
ServletContext as:
&l;%
application.setAttribute("foobar",foobar);
%>
To give the bean "request scope", you will have to place it within the request object as:
&l;%
request.setAttribute("foobar",foobar);
%>
If you do not place the bean within the request, session or application scope, the bean
can be accessed only within the current JSP page (page scope).
Once the bean is instantiated, it can be accessed in the usual way:
jsp:getProperty name="foobar" property="someProperty"/ jsp:setProperty
name="foobar" property="someProperty" value="someValue"/
Question Can I invoke a JSP error page from a servlet? (JSP)
Answer Yes, you can invoke the JSP error page and pass the exception object to it from within
a servlet. The trick is to create a request dispatcher for the JSP error page, and pass the
exception object as a javax.servlet.jsp.jspException request attribute. However, note
that you can do this from only within controller servlets. If your servlet opens an
OutputStream or PrintWriter, the JSP engine will throw the following translation error:
java.lang.IllegalStateException: Cannot forward as OutputStream or Writer has already
been obtained
 The following code snippet demonstrates the invocation of a JSP error page from within
a controller servlet:
protected void sendErrorRedirect(HttpServletRequest request, HttpServletResponse
response, String errorPageURL, Throwable e) throws ServletException, IOException {
request.setAttribute ("javax.servlet.jsp.jspException", e);
getServletConfig().getServletContext().
getRequestDispatcher(errorPageURL).forward(request, response);
}
public void doPost(HttpServletRequest request, HttpServletResponse response) {
try {
// do something
} catch (Exception ex) {
try {
sendErrorRedirect(request,response,"/jsp/MyErrorPage.jsp",ex);
} catch (Exception e) {
e.printStackTrace();
}
}
}
Question How can you store international / Unicode characters into a cookie? (JSP)
One way is, before storing the cookie URLEncode it.
Answer URLEnocder.encoder(str);
And use URLDecoder.decode(str) when you get the stored cookie.
Question What are the implicit objects? (JSP)
Implicit objects are objects that are created by the web container and contain
information related to a particular request, page, or application. They are:
request
response
pageContext
Answer session
application
out
config
page
exception
Question Is JSP technology extensible? (JSP)
YES. JSP technology is extensible through the development of custom actions, or tags,
Answer
which are encapsulated in tag libraries
How can I implement a thread-safe JSP page? What are the advantages and
Question
Disadvantages of using it? (JSP)
Answer You can make your JSPs thread-safe by having them implement the
SingleThreadModel interface. This is done by adding the directive
<%@ page isThreadSafe="false" %> within your JSP page.
With this, instead of a single instance of the servlet generated for your JSP page loaded
in memory, you will have N instances of the servlet loaded and initialized, with the
service method of each instance effectively synchronized. You can typically control the
number of instances (N) that are instantiated for all servlets implementing
SingleThreadModel through the admin screen for your JSP engine.
More importantly, avoid using the tag for variables. If you do use this tag, then you
 should set isThreadSafe to true, as mentioned above. Otherwise, all requests to that
page will access those variables, causing a nasty race condition.
SingleThreadModel is not recommended for normal use. There are many pitfalls,
including the example above of not being able to use . You should try really hard to
make them thread-safe the old fashioned way: by making them thread-safe
Question How does JSP handle run-time exceptions? (JSP)
You can use the errorPage attribute of the page directive to have uncaught run-time
exceptions automatically forwarded to an error processing page. For example:
<%@ page errorPage="error.jsp" %>
redirects the browser to the JSP page error.jsp if an uncaught exception is encountered
during request processing. Within error.jsp, if you indicate that it is an error-processing
Answer
page, via the directive:
<%@ page isErrorPage="true" %>
the Throwable object describing the exception may be accessed within the error page
via the exception implicit object.
Note: You must always use a relative URL as the value for the errorPage attribute.
How do I prevent the output of my JSP or Servlet pages from being cached
Question
by the browser? (JSP)
You will need to set the appropriate HTTP header attributes to prevent the
dynamic content output by the JSP page from being cached by the browser.
Just execute the following scriptlet at the beginning of your JSP pages to
prevent them from being cached at the browser. You need both the
statements to take care of some of the older browser versions.
Answer <%
response.setHeader("Cache-Control","no-store"); //HTTP 1.1
response.setHeader("Pragma","no-cache"); //HTTP 1.0
response.setDateHeader ("Expires", 0); //prevents caching at the proxy
server
%>
Question How do I use comments within a JSP page? (JSP)
You can use "JSP-style" comments to selectively block out code while debugging or
simply to comment your scriptlets. JSP comments are not visible at the client. For
example:
<%-- the scriptlet is now commented out
<%
out.println("Hello World");
%>
--%>
You can also use HTML-style comments anywhere within your JSP page. These
Answer comments are visible at the client. For example:
<!-- (c) 2004 javagalaxy.com -->
Of course, you can also use comments supported by your JSP scripting language within
your scriptlets. For example, assuming Java is the scripting language, you can have:
<%
//some comment
/**
yet another comment
**/
%>
Question Response has already been commited error. What does it mean? (JSP)
This error show only when you try to redirect a page after you already have written
something in your page. This happens because HTTP specification force the header to
be set up before the lay out of the page can be shown (to make sure of how it should be
displayed...content-type="text/html" or "text/xml" or "plain-text" or "image/jpg", etc...)
When you try to send a redirect status (Number is line_status_402), your HTTP server
cannot send it right now if it hasn't finished to set up the header. If not starter to set up
Answer the header, there are no problems, but if it 's already begin to set up the header, then
your HTTP server expects these headers to be finished setting up and it cannot be the
case if the stream of the page is not over... In this last case it's like you have a file
started with <HTML Tag> <Some Headers> <Body> some output (like testing your
variables...) ... and before you indicate that the file is over (and before the size of the
page can be setted up in the header), you try to send a redirect status... It s simply
impossible due to the specification of HTTP 1.0 and 1.1
Question How do I use a scriptlet to initialize a newly instantiated bean? (JSP)
A jsp:useBean action may optionally have a body. If the body is specified, its contents
will be automatically invoked when the specified bean is instantiated. Typically, the
body will contain scriptlets or jsp:setProperty tags to initialize the newly instantiated
bean, although you are not restricted to using those alone.
The following example shows the "today" property of the Foo bean initialized to the
current date when it is instantiated. Note that here, we make use of a JSP expression
Answer within the jsp:setProperty action.
<jsp:useBean id="foo" class="com.Bar.Foo" >
<jsp:setProperty name="foo" property="today"
value="<%=java.text.DateFormat.getDateInstance().format(new java.util.Date()) %>"/
>
<%-- scriptlets calling bean setter methods go here --%>
</jsp:useBean >

How can I enable session tracking for JSP pages if the browser has disabled cookies?
Question (JSP)

Answer We know that session tracking uses cookies by default to associate a session identifier
with a unique user. If the browser does not support cookies, or if cookies are disabled,
you can still enable session tracking using URL rewriting.
URL rewriting essentially includes the session ID within the link itself as a name/value
pair. However, for this to be effective, you need to append the session ID for each and
every link that is part of your servlet response.
Adding the session ID to a link is greatly simplified by means of of a couple of
methods: response.encodeURL() associates a session ID with a given URL, and if you
are using redirection, response.encodeRedirectURL() can be used by giving the
redirected URL as input.
Both encodeURL() and encodeRedirectedURL() first determine whether cookies are
supported by the browser; if so, the input URL is returned unchanged since the session
ID will be persisted as a cookie.
Consider the following example, in which two JSP files, say hello1.jsp and hello2.jsp,
interact with each other. Basically, we create a new session within hello1.jsp and place
an object within this session. The user can then traverse to hello2.jsp by clicking on the
link present within the page.Within hello2.jsp, we simply extract the object that was
earlier placed in the session and display its contents. Notice that we invoke the
 encodeURL() within hello1.jsp on the link used to invoke hello2.jsp; if cookies are
disabled, the session ID is automatically appended to the URL, allowing hello2.jsp to
still retrieve the session object.
Try this example first with cookies enabled. Then disable cookie support, restart the
brower, and try again. Each time you should see the maintenance of the session across
pages.
Do note that to get this example to work with cookies disabled at the browser, your JSP
engine has to support URL rewriting.
hello1.jsp
<%@ page session="true" %>
<%
Integer num = new Integer(100);
session.putValue("num",num);
String url =response.encodeURL("hello2.jsp");
%>
<a href='<%=url%>'>hello2.jsp</a>
hello2.jsp
<%@ page session="true" %>
<%
Integer i= (Integer )session.getValue("num");
out.println("Num value in session is "+i.intValue());

Question How can I declare methods within my JSP page? (JSP)

Answer You can declare methods for use within your JSP page as declarations. The methods
can then be invoked within any other methods you declare, or within JSP scriptlets and
expressions.
Do note that you do not have direct access to any of the JSP implicit objects like
request, response, session and so forth from within JSP methods. However, you should
be able to pass any of the implicit JSP variables as parameters to the methods you
declare. For example:
<%!
public String whereFrom(HttpServletRequest req) {
HttpSession ses = req.getSession();
...
return req.getRemoteHost();
}
%>
<%
out.print("Hi there, I see that you are coming in from ");
%>
<%= whereFrom(request) %>
Another Example
file1.jsp:
<%@page contentType="text/html"%>
<%!
public void test(JspWriter writer) throws IOException{
writer.println("Hello!");
}
%>
 file2.jsp
<%@include file="file1.jsp"%>
<html>
<body>
<%test(out);% >
</body>
</html>
Question Is there a way I can set the inactivity lease period on a per-session basis? (JSP)
Typically, a default inactivity lease period for all sessions is set within your JSP engine
admin screen or associated properties file. However, if your JSP engine supports the
Servlet 2.1 API, you can manage the inactivity lease period on a per-session basis. This
is done by invoking the HttpSession.setMaxInactiveInterval() method, right after the
session has been created. For example:
Answer
<%
session.setMaxInactiveInterval(300);
%>
would reset the inactivity period for this session to 5 minutes. The inactivity interval is
set in seconds.
Question How can I set a cookie and delete a cookie from within a JSP page? (JSP)
A cookie, mycookie, can be deleted using the following scriptlet:
<%
//creating a cookie
Cookie mycookie = new Cookie("aName","aValue");
response.addCookie(mycookie);
Answer //delete a cookie
Cookie killMyCookie = new Cookie("mycookie", null);
killMyCookie.setMaxAge(0);
killMyCookie.setPath("/");
response.addCookie(killMyCookie);
%>
Question How does a servlet communicate with a JSP page? (JSP)
Answer The following code snippet shows how a servlet instantiates a bean and initializes it
with FORM data posted by a browser. The bean is then placed into the request, and the
call is then forwarded to the JSP page, Bean1.jsp, by means of a request dispatcher for
downstream processing.
public void doPost (HttpServletRequest request, HttpServletResponse response) {
try {
govi.FormBean f = new govi.FormBean();
String id = request.getParameter("id");
f.setName(request.getParameter("name"));
f.setAddr(request.getParameter("addr"));
f.setAge(request.getParameter("age"));
//use the id to compute
//additional bean properties like info
//maybe perform a db query, etc.
// . . .
f.setPersonalizationInfo(info);
request.setAttribute("fBean",f);
getServletConfig().getServletContext().getRequestDispatcher
 ("/jsp/Bean1.jsp").forward(request, response);
} catch (Exception ex) {
...
}
}
The JSP page Bean1.jsp can then process fBean, after first extracting it from the default
request scope via the useBean action.
jsp:useBean id="fBean" class="govi.FormBean" scope="request"/ jsp:getProperty
name="fBean" property="name" / jsp:getProperty name="fBean" property="addr" /
jsp:getProperty name="fBean" property="age" / jsp:getProperty name="fBean"
property="personalizationInfo" /
How do I have the JSP-generated servlet subclass my own custom servlet class,
Question
instead of the default? (JSP)
One should be very careful when having JSP pages extend custom servlet classes as
opposed to the default one generated by the JSP engine. In doing so, you may lose out
on any advanced optimization that may be provided by the JSP engine. In any case,
your new superclass has to fulfill the contract with the JSP engine by:
Implementing the HttpJspPage interface, if the protocol used is HTTP, or implementing
JspPage otherwise Ensuring that all the methods in the Servlet interface are declared
final Additionally, your servlet superclass also needs to do the following:
Answer
The service() method has to invoke the _jspService() method
The init() method has to invoke the jspInit() method
The destroy() method has to invoke jspDestroy()
If any of the above conditions are not satisfied, the JSP engine may throw a translation
error.
Once the superclass has been developed, you can have your JSP extend it as follows:
<%@ page extends="packageName.ServletName" %<
How can I prevent the word "null" from appearing in my HTML input
Question
text fields when I populate them with a resultset that has null values? (JSP)
You could make a simple wrapper function, like
<%!
String blanknull(String s) {
return (s == null) ? "" : s;
Answer }
%>
then use it inside your JSP form, like
<input type="text" name="shoesize" value="<%=blanknull(shoesize)% >"
>
How can I get to print the stacktrace for an exception occuring within my JSP page?
Question (JSP)
Answer By printing out the exception's stack trace, you can usually diagonse a problem better
when debugging JSP pages. By looking at a stack trace, a programmer should be able to
discern which method threw the exception and which method called that method.
However, you cannot print the stacktrace using the JSP out implicit variable, which is
of type JspWriter. You will have to use a PrintWriter object instead. The following
snippet demonstrates how you can print a stacktrace from within a JSP error page:
<%@ page isErrorPage="true" %>
<%
out.println("
 ");
PrintWriter pw = response.getWriter();
exception.printStackTrace(pw);

out.println("
");
%>
Question How do you pass an InitParameter to a JSP? (JSP)
The JspPage interface defines the jspInit() and jspDestroy() method which the page
writer can use in their pages and are invoked in much the same manner as the init() and
destory() methods of a servlet. The example page below enumerates through all the
parameters and prints them to the console.
<%@ page import="java.util.*" %>
<%!
ServletConfig cfg =null;
public void jspInit(){
Answer
ServletConfig cfg=getServletConfig();
for (Enumeration e=cfg.getInitParameterNames(); e.hasMoreElements();) {
String name=(String)e.nextElement();
String value = cfg.getInitParameter(name);
System.out.println(name+"="+value);
}
}
%>
Question How can my JSP page communicate with an EJB Session Bean? (JSP)
The following is a code snippet that demonstrates how a JSP page can interact with an
EJB session bean:
<%@ page import="javax.naming.*, javax.rmi.PortableRemoteObject,
foo.AccountHome, foo.Account" %>
<%!
//declare a "global" reference to an instance of the home interface of the session bean
AccountHome accHome=null;
public void jspInit() {
//obtain an instance of the home interface
InitialContext cntxt = new InitialContext( );
Answer Object ref= cntxt.lookup("java:comp/env/ejb/AccountEJB");
accHome = (AccountHome)PortableRemoteObject.narrow(ref,AccountHome.class);
}
%>
<%
//instantiate the session bean
Account acct = accHome.create();
//invoke the remote methods
acct.doWhatever(...);
// etc etc...
%>
Question What is difference b/w model1 & model2 architechture (JSP)
Answer i don't know
Question How do you prevent the Creation of a Session in a JSP Page and why? (JSP)
 By default, a JSP page will automatically create a session for the request if one does
not exist. However, sessions consume resources and if it is not necessary to maintain a
session, one should not be created. For example, a marketing campaign may suggest the
reader visit a web page for more information. If it is anticipated that a lot of traffic will
Answer hit that page, you may want to optimize the load on the machine by not creating useless
sessions.

The page directive is used to prevent a JSP page from automatically creating a session:
<%@ page session="false">
Question What is the difference between page and request scopes? (JSP)
If you specify scope as Page then its life span is until page is displayed or control is
forwarded to a new page. Accessibility is current page only.
Answer But if u specify as Request, its life span is until the request has been completely
processed and the response has been sent back to the user. Accessibility is current page
and any included or for-warded pages
Question What is the difference between a tag handler and a tag handler class? (JSP)
The only difference between a tag handler and a tag handler class is that a tag handler
Answer
is written in JSP syntax, while a tag handler class is written in the Java language.
Question How do you precompile a jsp page? (JSP)
To precompile a JSP page, access the page with a query string of ?jsp_precompile
Answer http://www.javagalaxy.com:8080/RMI/index.jsp?jsp_precompile
the jsp page will not get executed by this action.
Question How do you print the contents of a.jsp in b.jsp. How do you include the file? (JSP)
a.jsp
<%!
public int i=10;
%>

b.jsp
Answer <%@ include file="a.jsp" %>
<%
out.println(i);
%>

do not use as this will include the file at runtime where as the above includes (directive
include) the file at compile time

1. What is JSP technology?

Java Server Page is a standard Java extension that is defined on top of the servlet
Extensions. The goal of JSP is the simplified creation and management of dynamic Web
pages. JSPs are secure, platform-independent, and best of all, make use of Java as a
server-side scripting language.

2. What is JSP page?

 A JSP page is a text-based document that contains two types of text: static template
data, which can be expressed in any text-based format such as HTML, SVG, WML, and
XML, and JSP elements, which construct dynamic content.

3. What are the implicit objects?

Implicit objects are objects that are created by the web container and contain
information related to a particular request, page, or application. They are:

o request
o response
o pageContext
o session
o application
o out
o config
o page
o exception
4. How many JSP scripting elements and what are they?

There are three scripting language elements:

1.declarations
2.scriptlets
3.expressions
2. Why are JSP pages the preferred API for creating a web-based client program?

Because no plug-ins or security policy files are needed on the client systems(applet
does). Also, JSP pages enable cleaner and more module application design because they
provide a way to separate applications programming from web page design. This means
personnel involved in web page design do not need to understand Java programming
language syntax to do their jobs.

3. Is JSP technology extensible?

YES. JSP technology is extensible through the development of custom actions, or tags,
which are encapsulated in tag libraries.

4. What are the two kinds of comments in JSP and what's the difference between them?

<%-- JSP Comment --%>

<!-- HTML Comment -->

5. In the Servlet 2.4 specification SingleThreadModel has been deprecates, why?

Because it is not practical to have such model. Whether you set isThreadSafe to true or
false, you should take care of concurrent client requests to the JSP page by
synchronizing access to any shared objects defined at the page level.
6. What is difference between custom JSP tags and beans?

Custom JSP tag is a tag you defined. You define how a tag, its attributes and its body
are interpreted, and then group your tags into collections called tag libraries that can be
used in any number of JSP files. To use custom JSP tags, you need to define three
separate components:

1.the tag handler class that defines the tag's behavior

2.the tag library descriptor file that maps the XML element names to the tag
implementations
3.the JSP file that uses the tag library

When the first two components are done, you can use the tag by using taglib directive:

<%@ taglib uri="xxx.tld" prefix="..." %>

Then you are ready to use the tags you defined. Let's say the tag prefix is test:

<test:tag1>MyJSPTag</test:tag1> or <test:tag1 />

JavaBeans are Java utility classes you defined. Beans have a standard format for Java
classes. You use tags

<jsp:useBean id="identifier" class="packageName.className"/>

to declare a bean and use

<jsp:setProperty name="identifier" property="classField" value="someValue" />

to set value of the bean class and use

<jsp:getProperty name="identifier" property="classField" />

<%=identifier.getclassField() %>

to get value of the bean class.

Custom tags and beans accomplish the same goals -- encapsulating complex behavior
into simple and accessible forms. There are several differences:

o Custom tags can manipulate JSP content; beans cannot.

o Complex operations can be reduced to a significantly simpler form with custom
tags than with beans.
o Custom tags require quite a bit more work to set up than do beans.
o Custom tags usually define relatively self-contained behavior, whereas beans are
often defined in one servlet and used in a different servlet or JSP page.
o Custom tags are available only in JSP 1.1 and later, but beans can be used in all
JSP 1.x versions.
 JSP
Q:What is a output comment?

A: A comment that is sent to the client in the viewable page source.The JSP
engine handles an output comment as uninterpreted HTML text, returning the
comment in the HTML output sent to the client. You can see the comment by viewing
the page source from your Web browser.
JSP Syntax
<!-- comment [ <%= expression %> ] -->

Example 1
<!-- This is a commnet sent to client on
<%= (new java.util.Date()).toLocaleString() %>
-->

Displays in the page source:

<!-- This is a commnet sent to client on January 24, 2004 -->
TOP

Q:What is a Hidden Comment?

A: A comments that documents the JSP page but is not sent to the client. The
JSP engine ignores a hidden comment, and does not process any code within hidden
comment tags. A hidden comment is not sent to the client, either in the displayed
JSP page or the HTML page source. The hidden comment is useful when you want to
hide or "comment out" part of your JSP page.

You can use any characters in the body of the comment except the closing --%>
combination. If you need to use --%> in your comment, you can escape it by typing
--%\>.
JSP Syntax
<%-- comment --%>

Examples
<%@ page language="java" %>
<html>
<head><title>A Hidden Comment </title></head>
<body>
<%-- This comment will not be visible to the colent in the page source --%>
</body>
</html>

TOP

Q:What is a Expression?
A: An expression tag contains a scripting language expression that is evaluated,
converted to a String, and inserted where the expression appears in the JSP file.
Because the value of an expression is converted to a String, you can use an
expression within text in a JSP file. Like
<%= someexpression %>
<%= (new java.util.Date()).toLocaleString() %>
You cannot use a semicolon to end an expression
TOP

Q:What is a Declaration?

A: A declaration declares one or more variables or methods for use later in the
JSP source file.

A declaration must contain at least one complete declarative statement. You can
declare any number of variables or methods within one declaration tag, as long as
they are separated by semicolons. The declaration must be valid in the scripting
language used in the JSP file.

<%! somedeclarations %>

<%! int i = 0; %>
<%! int a, b, c; %>

TOP

Q:What is a Scriptlet?

A: A scriptlet can contain any number of language statements, variable or

method declarations, or expressions that are valid in the page scripting
language.Within scriptlet tags, you can

1.Declare variables or methods to use later in the file (see also Declaration).

2.Write expressions valid in the page scripting language (see also Expression).

3.Use any of the JSP implicit objects or any object declared with a <jsp:useBean>
tag.
You must write plain text, HTML-encoded text, or other JSP tags outside the scriptlet.

Scriptlets are executed at request time, when the JSP engine processes the client
request. If the scriptlet produces output, the output is stored in the out object, from
which you can display it.

TOP

Q:What are implicit objects? List them?

A: Certain objects that are available for the use in JSP documents without being
declared first. These objects are parsed by the JSP engine and inserted into the
generated servlet. The implicit objects re listed below

• request
• response
• pageContext
• session
• application
• out
• config
• page
• exception

TOP

Q:Difference between forward and sendRedirect?

A: When you invoke a forward request, the request is sent to another resource on the
server, without the client being informed that a different resource is going to process
the request. This process occurs completly with in the web container. When a
sendRedirtect method is invoked, it causes the web container to return to the
browser indicating that a new URL should be requested. Because the browser issues
a completly new request any object that are stored as request attributes before the
redirect occurs will be lost. This extra round trip a redirect is slower than forward.
TOP

Q:What are the different scope valiues for the <jsp:useBean>?

A: The different scope values for <jsp:useBean> are

1. page
2. request
3.session
4.application

TOP

Q:Explain the life-cycle mehtods in JSP?

A: THe generated servlet class for a JSP page implements the HttpJspPage interface
of the javax.servlet.jsp package. Hte HttpJspPage interface extends the JspPage
interface which inturn extends the Servlet interface of the javax.servlet package. the
generated servlet class thus implements all the methods of the these three
interfaces. The JspPage interface declares only two mehtods - jspInit() and
jspDestroy() that must be implemented by all JSP pages regardless of the client-
server protocol. However the JSP specification has provided the HttpJspPage
interfaec specifically for the JSp pages serving HTTP requests. This interface declares
one method _jspService().
The jspInit()- The container calls the jspInit() to initialize te servlet instance.It is
called before any other method, and is called only once for a servlet instance.
The _jspservice()- The container calls the _jspservice() for each request, passing it
the request and the response objects.
The jspDestroy()- The container calls this when it decides take the instance out of
service. It is the last method called n the servlet instance.