CS320 F04 HW3

Homework 3
CS320, Fall 2004

Due: Thursday, Oct 28

Please upload your files using the online turnin server. The files should include all the source code, documentation, and an HTML file hw3.html, which contains a link to your JSP page on the CS server. Note that file uploading will be disabled automatically after 11:59PM of the due date, so please turn in your work on time.

[Reading]

Textbook - Chapter 10, 11, 12, 14, and 16.
J2EE Tutorial - Chapter 12 up to "Using Custom Tags", and the sections about JSTL Core and Functions in Chapter 14.
JSTL 1.1 Tag References - Again, only Core and Functions.

[JSP Calendar] (65pt)

Convert your calendar servlet from Homework 2 to JSP. You do not have to implement any new features, however, your JSP implementation of the calendar must meet the following requirements:

No scripting elements. The only exception for this requirement is the Logout feature, which you may implement as

<%
    if( request.getParameter("logout") != null )
    {
        session.invalidate();
        response.sendRedirect("Login.jsp");
    }
%>

There are ways to get rid of this scriptlet too, but we'll have to wait until we discuss custom taglibs. Also note that comments and directives are not considered as scripting elements.

All features described in Homework 1 and Homework 2 must work in this implementation. Failing to meet this requirement will incur up to 30pt credit penalty.

And again, particularly good design will receive up to 15pt extra credit.

[Bean Implementation Issues] (15pt)

The easiest way to convert the servlet calendar to a bean is probably implementing the bean as follows:

A write-only (or read/write) property which sets the year selected by a user
A write-only (or read/write) property which sets the month selected by a user
A write-only (or read/write) property which sets the date selected by a user. You may not even need this property if you decide to keep this information outside the bean.
A read-only property which returns the whole calendar table as a string.

In your hw3.html, answer the following questions:

(a) What is the problem(s) of this implementation, not in terms of correctness, but in terms of meeting the design goal of separating presentation from processing?
(b) Is there any alternative implementation that addresses the problem described in (a)? If the answer is yes, brief describe the implementation (and if the answer is no, you lose 5pt).
(c) Is there any way we can address the problem described in (a) without using a different implementation (because, after all, we like easy implementations)?