JSP Today

[Michael42]

Hello,

I am new to the world of JSP. I want to avoid learning legacy ways of using JSP rather than ones that are useful and scaleable. I know at this point I will be using both Tomcat and Oracle 9iAS in some environments.

1. What JSP resources\techniques etc. should I invest time to build useful and scaleable content?
2. Are there any JSP resources\techniques that you would stay away from at this point?

I really appreciate your comments,

Michael42

 

[sedj]

http://java.sun.com/products/jsp/

http://java.sun.com/products/jsp/reference/techart/index.html

http://java.sun.com/products/jsp/docs.html

 

[Michael42]

sedj, thanks again.

Michael42

 

[siberian]

My two tips

1) Avoid using jsp like a scripting language. Its my personal style and opinion but I generally think having 45 lines of jsp code embedded in a page is a Bad Thing, use taglibs and the like.

2) Check out the plethora of architectures out there. I personally love Jakarta Struts but there are many other options that are fantastic. Many times these have a steep learning curve but the payoff can be large.

These are just my suggestions.

 

[sedj]

I agree with siberian generally there, with two small points to remember :

1) using script tags in JSP should generally be avoided, but sometimes it does make sense for small operations - the rule for me is, try to avoid them, but if the "proper" way will take substantially longer, then don't worry too much about it.

2) Go steady with frameworks such as struts. For large projects, it can really make sense, but for many smaller sites, it can just be overkill ...

 

[siberian]

Yah, sedj is correct on the overkill, always scale your infrastructure to the project at hand.

I tend to 'think' in MVC (been doing this for awhile) so I use things like struts even for small projects, its just faster for me that way.

But if its not required it really is just overkill and extra code.

 

[Michael42]

Great advice. This is exactly the type of feedback I was hoping for. You guys have been there and though I used JSP very early on in an encapsulated framework (a proprietary portal API) JSP has obviously matured a great deal.

Thanks again,

Michael42