Testing Struts Application
It will be noticed that there are a lot
of 'system.out.println's in the action class code.Intentionally so! The step by
step progress gets printed in the Tomcat console and is very instructive. When
trouble occurs, it aids in diagnosis greatly.It also gives us a clear
understanding.
------------------------------------------
But, understanding the code is one thing
( and the easier thing at that) and actually executing the program ,is quite a
different thing altogether! We must do each step with maximum care, to avoid a
lot of problems.
------------------------------------------
We begin by creating a
folder( say)
g:\examplestruts>
Our proposed package name is
demo1;
So create a subfolder named 'demo1'.
cd to
g:\examplestruts\demo1
--
Create the following six files in demo1
folder.
i)
query.jsp
ii)
QueryForm.java
iii)
QueryAction.java
iv)
sqlbean.java
v) resultbean.java
vi)
result.jsp
------------------------------------
We cannot compile
QueryForm.java & QueryAction.java , unless we first instal Struts in our
system.
---------------------------------
How do we instal Struts in
our system?
-----------------
steps.
-------------
1)transfer jakarta-struts1.1
zip file from DeveloperIQ CD to
g:drive.
2)unzip it into
c:\unzipped.
3)It got unzipped as jakarta-struts1.1
folder.
----------------------------------------------
We get three folders and 3
files.
4) The 3 folders are
a)contrib
b) lib
c)
webapps
============
The 3 files are:
5)
a) readme.txt
b) license.txt
c) instal.txt
-----------------------------------------------
6) open webapps folder.
7) we will find the
following war files there.(
web-application-archives)
a)struts-blank
b)struts-documentation
c) struts-example
d) struts-exercise-taglib
e) struts-template
f) struts-upload
g)
struts-validator
----------------------------------------------
8) copy struts-blank.war
into:
g:\tomcat41\webapps
folder.
----------------------------------------------
9) In a DOS window, cd to g:\tomcat41\bin
10) >set
JAVA_HOME=D:\JDK1.4
11)
startup
-----
12) tomcat server gets
started .
13) Now in another dos window
, check up that struts-blank.war has automatically expanded by the server and we get a
folder named
struts-blank.
14) If you expand struts-blank folder,
there are 3 subfolders there.
i) META-INF
ii) WEB-INF
iii)
pages
There is also an
index.jsp
-----------------------------------------------
15) start the browser and
type the url as :
http://localhost:8080/struts-blank/index.jsp
----------------------------------------------
16) You will get the
corresponding display as follows:
Welcome!
To get started
on your own application, copy the struts-blank.war to a new WAR file using the
name for your application. Place it in your container's "webapp" folder (or
equivalent), and let your container auto-deploy the application. Edit the
skeleton configuration files as needed, restart your container, and you are on
your way! (You can find the application.properties file with this message in the
/WEB-INF/src/java/resources folder
-----------------------------------------------
Thus, we have correctly installed struts
in our tomcat server.
===========================================
Inside the WEB-INF
folder, we have the following subfolders and files.
sub-folders
i)classes
ii)
lib
iii)
src
-----------------------
files
===
tld files ( 6 files)
=====
1)
struts-bean.tld
2)
struts-html.tld
3)
struts-logic.tld
4)
struts-template.tld
5) struts-tiles.tld
6)
struts-nested.tld
-------------------
xml files ( 5 files).
=====
i)
web.xml
ii)
struts-config.xml
iii)
tiles-defs.xml
iv) validation.xml
v)
validator-rules.xml
============================================
There are a number of jar
files available in lib folder.
i)
commons-beanutils.jar
ii)
commons-collections.jar
iii)
commons-digester.jar
iv)
commons-fileupload.jar
v)
commons-lang.jar
vi)
commons-logging.jar
vii)
commons-validator.jar
viii)
jakarta-oro.jar
ix) struts.jar
-------------------------------------
All this is just
for information.
===========================================
When we want to build our own
application, we first copy
struts-blank folder in the webapps
folder of tomcat & Rename the folder .(say) sam. And restart the
Tomcat server.
struts.jar
was copied
to c:\quick folder for easily remembering the classpath.
==============================================Now,
we are ready to begin compiling.
We are now in
g:\examplestruts\demo1
>set path=c:\windows\command;d:\jdk1.4\bin
>set classpath=g:\examplestruts;c:\quick\struts.jar;d:\tomcat41\common\lib\servlet.jar
..demo1>javac
QueryForm.java
..demo1>javac
sqlbean.java
..demo1>javac
resultbean.java
..demo1>javac
QueryAction.java
( if we compile the files
one
after the other, in this
sequence, we will be able to compile easily.
After compiling, copy all the
class files in this folder to:
g:\tomcat41\webapps\sam\WEB-INF\classes\demo1
copy query.jsp &
result.jsp to:
'g:\tomcat41\webapps\sam'
now in another
dos window, cd to:
g:\tomcat41\webapps\
sam\WEB-INF\struts-config.xml
edit
the
struts-config.xml as
follows:
==========================================
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="ISO-8859-1"
?>
<!DOCTYPE struts-config PUBLIC
"-//Apache
Software Foundation// DTD Struts Configuration 1.1//EN"
"http://jakarta.apache.org/struts/ dtds/struts-config_1_1.dtd">
<struts-config>
<form-beans>
<form-bean
name="queryForm"
type="demo1.QueryForm"
/>
</form-beans>
<action-mappings>
<action
path="/Query"
type="demo1.QueryAction"
name="queryForm"
scope="session"
input="/query.jsp" >
<forward
name="success" path="/result.jsp"
/>
<forward
name="failure" path="/query.jsp"
/>
</action>
</action-mappings>
</struts-config>
==============================================
--
After all these steps, restart the
Tomcat server, so that the settings become effective.
Type the URL in browser as:
'http://localhost:8080/sam/query.jsp'
You should get a form with orange background,
etc.
If we type the password as 'ADMINISTRATOR' and the sql
as 'select * from table1', we will get the query result. ( Ofcourse, the example
presumes the usual creation of a simple
Access database named 'dbdemo' with just table1 having two fields ( name,
place) and registering it in
ODBC.
If the password is wrong, the page appears to be not
responding just showing whatever we
typed.
So, our adventure
with Struts has had a happy ending.
If we get, this far, we can and must build up
further
by
in-depth study of
books.& articles.
In the
forthcoming instalments, we will see advanced Struts topics like
:
DynaForm
Validator
Framework
Tiles
RequestProcessor
Scaffold
Struts-Tags
------------------------
This tutorial cannot be a substitute for hundreds of articles and dozens of
books on Struts .It is but a simple introduction .
Respectful
Acknowledgements to:
1) 'Struts
your Applications'
by
Piyush
SriVasthava
( DeveloperIQ---November-2002)
2) 'Understanding Struts
Framework'
by
Manoj Kothale
(
DeveloperIQ.....August-2003)
==================================
Suggested Reading:
1)
Struts in Action .
by
Ted
Husted
( Manning press/
DreamTech publication)
2)
Mastering Jakarata Struts
by
James
Goodwill
(Wiley/DreamTexh)
3)
Professional Struts Applications
by
John
Carnell
( Wrox )
==============================================
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