I definitely like the idea of a forward attribute on actions. Not only is it
more flexible than just a path, but it also means that, in most cases, the
path itself will exist only once in the config file, instead of twice or
more. Once is more maintainable.
I'm not so sure about the second change. It means that, for people who want
to put their JSP files under WEB-INF, we're dictating the directory
structure they have to use, at least at the top level. That may be OK for
some folks, but probably not for everyone.
In my particular case, the path to my JSP files looks like this:
/WEB-INF/modules/module1/pages/foo.jsp
(I'm using the term 'module' instead of 'sub-app' here.)
That is, I have a directory under WEB-INF named 'modules', and every direct
descendant of 'modules' is a module directory. This has all sorts of
advantages for my app, but I won't go into that here.
One idea (that is perhaps even more kludgey :) would be to use some kind of
token in the path that computeURL could substitute for, if it's present (and
perhaps only if WEB-INF is found in the path). For example, the path I
listed earlier might show up in the config file as:
/WEB-INF/modules/$MODULE$/pages/foo.jsp
and computeURL would replace '$MODULE$' with 'module1'.
--
Martin Cooper
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Craig R. McClanahan [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
> Sent: Monday, July 01, 2002 12:11 PM
> To: Struts Developers List
> Subject: Subapps and /WEB-INF (was: Re: DO NOT REPLY [Bug 10268] -
> Sub-apps need context-relative option for 'input' of an Action)
>
>
> Martin raises some interesting issues in this enhancement
> request that I'd
> like to discuss a little before we figure out what to do.
>
> The simplest issue is a design faux pas in the original struts-config
> setup -- the "input" parameter really should have been the name of a
> corresponding forward, so that we could auto-calculate the
> actual URL more
> gracefully. We can't change the past, but it wouldn't be
> hard to add an
> additional "forward" attribute as an alternative to "input",
> that works
> this way. What do you think?
>
> The more important issue Martin raises is that the algorithm for
> sub-application mapping (context-relative prefix) doesn't
> play very nice
> with folks who want to put their JSP pages in the /WEB-INF
> subdirectory.
> One way to get around this would be to modify the algorithm
> for converting
> a subapp-relative path into an absolute path in
> RequestUtils.computeURL().
> Instead of always sticking the subapp prefix before the
> specified path,
> it would look at the subapp-relative path and, if it started with
> "/WEB-INF" and perform the appropriate surgery. Thus, a
> forward to the
> subapp relative page "/WEB-INF/foo.jsp" in subapp "/mysubapp"
> would end up
> creating the URL:
>
> /WEB-INF/mysubapp/foo.jsp
>
> instead of the current:
>
> /mysubapp/WEB-INF/foo.jsp
>
> While this is sort of a kludge (and the whole algorithm is
> something that
> should be more easily pluggable in a post-1.1 design), it
> *is* backwards
> compatible with current usage without subapps (i.e. the path
> of a page for
> the default subapp is the same as it is now).
>
> What do you think about implementing both of these options
> (new "forward"
> option on <action>, and the calculation change)? Together, I
> think they
> address what Martin is after, and deals with the more general
> problems of
> using subapps together with /WEB-INF.
>
> Craig
>
>
> On 1 Jul 2002 [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
>
> > Date: 1 Jul 2002 18:10:02 -0000
> > From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> > Reply-To: Struts Developers List <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> > To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> > Subject: DO NOT REPLY [Bug 10268] - Sub-apps need
> context-relative
> > option for 'input' of an Action
> >
> > DO NOT REPLY TO THIS EMAIL, BUT PLEASE POST YOUR BUG
> > RELATED COMMENTS THROUGH THE WEB INTERFACE AVAILABLE AT
> > <http://nagoya.apache.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=10268>.
> > ANY REPLY MADE TO THIS MESSAGE WILL NOT BE COLLECTED AND
> > INSERTED IN THE BUG DATABASE.
> >
> > http://nagoya.apache.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=10268
> >
> > Sub-apps need context-relative option for 'input' of an Action
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > ------- Additional Comments From [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> 2002-07-01 18:10 -------
> > The problem is, my JSP pages are under WEB-INF, and the
> computed URL messes up
> > the path to that directory. If my action config looks like this:
> >
> > <action ... input='/WEB-INF/pages/myPage.jsp' ... />
> >
> > then the computed URL looks like this:
> >
> > /myApp/mySubApp/WEB-INF/pages/myPage.jsp
> >
> > which is incorrect - the sub-app name should not be there.
> It needs to be:
> >
> > /myApp/WEB-INF/pages/myPage.jsp
> >
> > to work correctly.
> >
> > There was also a thread on struts-user a while ago where
> someone else was
> > having a similar problem:
> >
> > http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/?l=struts-user&m=101865931500963&w=2
> >
> > --
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