How to assign names to buttons and tell which button was pressed in the Action class?

[Peter Primrose]

Hi guys,

Up until today I had only 2 buttons in my struts pages (usually submit and cancel). They worked fine since I used to ask the code below in my Action class:

 Boolean bCancel = (Boolean)request.getAttribute("org.apache.struts.action.CANCEL");
  

If it wasn�t cancel � it was submit and life was easy and fun.

So�what if I have 5 buttons in my page, how can I tell which button the user has pressed?

In swing, that�s easy: JButton b1 = new JButton() and later:
If (e.getSource==b1) //I call it by the name
{

}


How can I assign names to each button and tell in my action class which button was pressed.

Thanks

[Merrill Higginson]

Like this:

In your JSP:
<html:submit property="colorButton" value="red" />
<html:submit property="colorButton" value="blue" />
<html:submit property="colorButton" value="green" />
<html:submit property="colorButton" value="orange" />

In your ActionForm:

private String colorButton;
public String getColorButton() { return colorButton; }
public void setColorButton(String color) {this.colorButton = color;}

In the execute method of your Action class:

if ("red".equals(myForm.getColorButton())) {
  // do something;
} else if ("green".equals(myForm.getColorButton())) {
  // do something;
} else if ("blue".equals(myForm.getColorButton())) {
  // do something;
} else if ("orange".equals(myForm.getColorButton())) {
  // do something;
}

You could also make your Action extend DispatchAction.

P.S. Just so you know, in the case of a cancel button, The Action class has an isCancelled method that accomplishes the same thing as your code above.
[ October 05, 2006: Message edited by: Merrill Higginson ]

[Peter Primrose]

*PERFECT*

I did this (disregard the naming and the fw, only for testing):
struts-config.xml

  
 <actionpath="/myaccount"
           type="com.struts.account.AccountAction"
           name="AccountForm"
scope="request"
           input="/pages/layout/myaccount.jsp"
           validate="false">
<forward name="logout" path="/pages/layout/myaccount.jsp"/>
<forward name="success" path="/pages/layout/myaccount.jsp"/>
    </action>
  

and the bean

   
    <form-beanname="AccountForm" 
    type="org.apache.struts.action.DynaActionForm">
    <form-property name="colorButton"
 type="java.lang.String" 
        initial=""/>
     </form-bean>
 

the coode in the jsp just as you instructed and when it gets to the ACTION, I did this:

String action = (String)((DynaActionForm)form).get("colorButton");

I did this without the usage of DispatchAction. I wonder what is the value of DispatchAction and would that eliminate the bean? if so, how would the Action look like (I must get the property somehow?!)

thank you Merrill!

[Merrill Higginson]

DispatchAction would not eliminate the need for an ActionForm bean. It is used if you want to avoid a long if/else structure in your program. It allows you to create individual methods for each of the buttons that are automatically called by DispatchAction.

This link gives a good explanation of what DispatchAction does and how to use it.
[ October 06, 2006: Message edited by: Merrill Higginson ]