Appendix G. spring.tld
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## Appendix G. spring.tld

## G.1 Introduction

One of the view technologies you can use with the Spring Framework is Java Server Pages (JSPs). To help you implement views using Java Server Pages the Spring Framework provides you with some tags for evaluating errors, setting themes and outputting internationalized messages.

Please note that the various tags generated by this form tag library are compliant with the XHTML-1.0-Strict specification and attendant DTD.

This appendix describes the `spring.tld` tag library.

- Section G.2, “The `bind` tag”
- Section G.3, “The `escapeBody` tag”
- Section G.4, “The `hasBindErrors` tag”
- Section G.5, “The `htmlEscape` tag”
- Section G.6, “The `message` tag”
- Section G.7, “The `nestedPath` tag”
- Section G.8, “The `theme` tag”
- Section G.9, “The `transform` tag”
- Section G.10, “The `url` tag”
- Section G.11, “The `eval` tag”

## G.2 The `bind` tag

Provides BindStatus object for the given bind path. The HTML escaping flag participates in a page-wide or application-wide setting (i.e. by HtmlEscapeTag or a "defaultHtmlEscape" context-param in web.xml).

Table G.1. Attributes

Attribute | Required? | Runtime Expression? | Description
--- | --- | --- | ---
htmlEscape | false | true | Set HTML escaping for this tag, as boolean value. Overrides the default HTML escaping setting for the current page.
ignoreNestedPath | false | true | Set whether to ignore a nested path, if any. Default is to not ignore.
path | true | true | The path to the bean or bean property to bind status information for. For instance account.name, company.address.zipCode or just employee. The status object will exported to the page scope, specifically for this bean or bean property

## G.3 The `escapeBody` tag

Escapes its enclosed body content, applying HTML escaping and/or JavaScript escaping. The HTML escaping flag participates in a page-wide or application-wide setting (i.e. by HtmlEscapeTag or a "defaultHtmlEscape" context-param in web.xml).

Table G.2. Attributes

Attribute | Required? | Runtime Expression? | Description
--- | --- | --- | ---
htmlEscape | false | true | Set HTML escaping for this tag, as boolean value. Overrides the default HTML escaping setting for the current page.
javaScriptEscape | false | true | Set JavaScript escaping for this tag, as boolean value. Default is false.

## G.4 The `hasBindErrors` tag

Provides Errors instance in case of bind errors. The HTML escaping flag participates in a page-wide or application-wide setting (i.e. by HtmlEscapeTag or a "defaultHtmlEscape" context-param in web.xml).

Table G.3. Attributes

Attribute | Required? | Runtime Expression? | Description
--- | --- | --- | ---
htmlEscape | false | true | Set HTML escaping for this tag, as boolean value. Overrides the default HTML escaping setting for the current page.
name | true | true | The name of the bean in the request, that needs to be inspected for errors. If errors are available for this bean, they will be bound under the 'errors' key.

## G.5 The `htmlEscape` tag

Sets default HTML escape value for the current page. Overrides a "defaultHtmlEscape" context-param in web.xml, if any.

Table G.4. Attributes

Attribute | Required? | Runtime Expression? | Description
--- | --- | --- | ---
defaultHtmlEscape | true | true | Set the default value for HTML escaping, to be put into the current PageContext.

## G.6 The `message` tag

Retrieves the message with the given code, or text if code isn't resolvable. The HTML escaping flag participates in a page-wide or application-wide setting (i.e. by HtmlEscapeTag or a "defaultHtmlEscape" context-param in web.xml).

Table G.5. Attributes

Attribute | Required? | Runtime Expression? | Description
--- | --- | --- | ---
arguments | false | true | Set optional message arguments for this tag, as a (comma-)delimited String (each String argument can contain JSP EL), an Object array (used as argument array), or a single Object (used as single argument).
argumentSeparator | false | true | The separator character to be used for splitting the arguments string value; defaults to a 'comma' (',').
code | false | true | The code (key) to use when looking up the message. If code is not provided, the text attribute will be used.
htmlEscape | false | true | Set HTML escaping for this tag, as boolean value. Overrides the default HTML escaping setting for the current page.
javaScriptEscape | false | true | Set JavaScript escaping for this tag, as boolean value. Default is false.

message

false

true

A MessageSourceResolvable argument (direct or through JSP EL). Fits nicely when used in conjunction with Spring's own validation error classes which all implement the MessageSourceResolvable interface. For example, this allows you to iterate over all of the errors in a form, passing each error (using a runtime expression) as the value of this 'message' attribute, thus effecting the easy display of such error messages.

scope | false | true | The scope to use when exporting the result to a variable. This attribute is only used when var is also set. Possible values are page, request, session and application.
text | false | true | Default text to output when a message for the given code could not be found. If both text and code are not set, the tag will output null.
var | false | true | The string to use when binding the result to the page, request, session or application scope. If not specified, the result gets outputted to the writer (i.e. typically directly to the JSP).

## G.7 The `nestedPath` tag

Sets a nested path to be used by the bind tag's path.

Table G.6. Attributes

Attribute | Required? | Runtime Expression? | Description
--- | --- | --- | ---
path | true | true | Set the path that this tag should apply. E.g. 'customer' to allow bind paths like 'address.street' rather than 'customer.address.street'.

## G.8 The `theme` tag

Retrieves the theme message with the given code, or text if code isn't resolvable. The HTML escaping flag participates in a page-wide or application-wide setting (i.e. by HtmlEscapeTag or a "defaultHtmlEscape" context-param in web.xml).

Table G.7. Attributes

Attribute | Required? | Runtime Expression? | Description
--- | --- | --- | ---
arguments | false | true | Set optional message arguments for this tag, as a (comma-)delimited String (each String argument can contain JSP EL), an Object array (used as argument array), or a single Object (used as single argument).
argumentSeparator | false | true | The separator character to be used for splitting the arguments string value; defaults to a 'comma' (',').
code | false | true | The code (key) to use when looking up the message. If code is not provided, the text attribute will be used.
htmlEscape | false | true | Set HTML escaping for this tag, as boolean value. Overrides the default HTML escaping setting for the current page.
javaScriptEscape | false | true | Set JavaScript escaping for this tag, as boolean value. Default is false.
message | false | true | A MessageSourceResolvable argument (direct or through JSP EL).
scope | false | true | The scope to use when exporting the result to a variable. This attribute is only used when var is also set. Possible values are page, request, session and application.
text | false | true | Default text to output when a message for the given code could not be found. If both text and code are not set, the tag will output null.
var | false | true | The string to use when binding the result to the page, request, session or application scope. If not specified, the result gets outputted to the writer (i.e. typically directly to the JSP).

## G.9 The `transform` tag

Provides transformation of variables to Strings, using an appropriate custom PropertyEditor from BindTag (can only be used inside BindTag). The HTML escaping flag participates in a page-wide or application-wide setting (i.e. by HtmlEscapeTag or a 'defaultHtmlEscape' context-param in web.xml).

Table G.8. Attributes

Attribute | Required? | Runtime Expression? | Description
--- | --- | --- | ---
htmlEscape | false | true | Set HTML escaping for this tag, as boolean value. Overrides the default HTML escaping setting for the current page.
scope | false | true | The scope to use when exported the result to a variable. This attribute is only used when var is also set. Possible values are page, request, session and application.
value | true | true | The value to transform. This is the actual object you want to have transformed (for instance a Date). Using the PropertyEditor that is currently in use by the 'spring:bind' tag.
var | false | true | The string to use when binding the result to the page, request, session or application scope. If not specified, the result gets outputted to the writer (i.e. typically directly to the JSP).

## G.10 The `url` tag

Creates URLs with support for URI template variables, HTML/XML escaping, and Javascript escaping. Modeled after the JSTL c:url tag with backwards compatibility in mind.

Table G.9. Attributes

Attribute | Required? | Runtime Expression? | Description
--- | --- | --- | ---
url | true | true | The URL to build. This value can include template {placeholders} that are replaced with the URL encoded value of the named parameter. Parameters must be defined using the param tag inside the body of this tag.
context | false | true | Specifies a remote application context path. The default is the current application context path.
var | false | true | The name of the variable to export the URL value to. If not specified the URL is written as output.
scope | false | true | The scope for the var. 'application', 'session', 'request' and 'page' scopes are supported. Defaults to page scope. This attribute has no effect unless the var attribute is also defined.
htmlEscape | false | true | Set HTML escaping for this tag, as a boolean value. Overrides the default HTML escaping setting for the current page.
javaScriptEscape | false | true | Set JavaScript escaping for this tag, as a boolean value. Default is false.

## G.11 The `eval` tag

Evaluates a Spring expression (SpEL) and either prints the result or assigns it to a variable.

Table G.10. Attributes

Attribute | Required? | Runtime Expression? | Description
--- | --- | --- | ---
expression | true | true | The expression to evaluate.
var | false | true | The name of the variable to export the evaluation result to. If not specified the evaluation result is converted to a String and written as output.
scope | false | true | The scope for the var. 'application', 'session', 'request' and 'page' scopes are supported. Defaults to page scope. This attribute has no effect unless the var attribute is also defined.
htmlEscape | false | true | Set HTML escaping for this tag, as a boolean value. Overrides the default HTML escaping setting for the current page.
javaScriptEscape | false | true | Set JavaScript escaping for this tag, as a boolean value. Default is false.

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