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JSP: Creating Dynamic Titles

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One of the main advantages of JavaServer Pages is the ability to generate
dynamic content. JSPs generate dynamic HTML pages by using Java control
structures like for loops and if statements. As a result, forms can be generated
dynamically following some specified logical layout.


Consider the simple task of generating a string repeatedly. This can easily
be done by putting the string inside a for loop. The
listing below provides a simple example of a JSP that generates a dynamic
response to the user. The example consists of generating several progressively
smaller HTML headers. Each header is lighter in color than the preceding one.


Listing: dynamicTitles.jsp


 1:
<HTML><HEAD><TITLE>Dynamic
Titles</TITLE></HEAD>
 2:
<BODY>
 3: <CENTER>
 4: <%  String[] colorArray = { “00”, “11”,
“22”, “33”,
 5:                            
“44”, “55”, “66”, “77”,
 6:                            
“88”, “99”, “AA”, “BB”,
 7:                            
“CC”, “DD”, “EE”, “FF”};
 8:     for(int j=1; j<5;
j++){
 9:         String
fgColor = colorArray[j*3]+colorArray[j*3]+colorArray[j*3];%>
10:        
<H<%=j%>>
11:        
<FONT COLOR=<%=fgColor%>>
12:         JSPs
are great !!!
13:        
</FONT>
14:        
</H<%=j%>>
15: <% 
}   %>
16: </CENTER>
17: </BODY></HTML>


Line 4 declares a colorArray containing a
hexadecimal color string. Color in HTML is defined as the combination of the
colors red, green and blue. Each of these has hexadecimal values from 00 to FF
(0 to 255 in decimal), and the three are combined by concatenating their values.
So purple would be FF00FF, black would be 000000, white FFFFFF, and so on.


These colors are combined in the fgColor string in
line 9. Since all three color components are the same, the resulting color is
several shades of gray, as Figure 1 shows. The index j of the for loop in line 8 is used to reference the colorArray in line 9 and then in line 10 to declare
progressively smaller headers (H1, H2, … , H4). The color of the header JSPs are great !!! (line 12) is set using a FONT tag in
line 11.




Figure 1: dynamicTitles.jsp produces a set of
progressively smaller and lighter HTML headers.


Summary


There are many ways to use JSPs to generate dynamic content. This article
showed you how to generate dynamic titles.

About the Authors:


Jose Annunziato received his Master’s and Doctor of Science
degrees in computer science from the University of Massachusetts. Lowell. Dr.
Annunziato works for BEA Systems where he develops courseware products such as
WebLogic Server, WebLogic Commerce Server, and WebLogic Enterprise.


Stephanie Fesler Kaminaris has written hundreds of pages of
course materials on Web development, such as HTML, JavaScript, Active Server
Pages, VBScript, and CGI programming. She has also written course materials for
BEA’s WebLogic Server courses, such as WebLogic as a Web Server, Java Server
Pages, Servlets, and Web Applications.




This article is based on techniques presented in Sams
Teach Yourself JavaServer Pages in 24 Hours
(0672320231) – a
book by Jose Annunziato and Stephanie Fesler Kaminaris, with Sams Publishing.


&copy Copyright Sams
Publishing
, All Rights Reserved



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