Open Sources Resources

Struts Frame work is the implementation of Model-View-Controller (MVC) design pattern for the JSP. Struts is maintained as a part of Apache Jakarta project and is open source. Struts Framework is suited for the application of any size. Latest version of struts can be downloaded from http://jakarta.apache.org/. We are using jakarta-struts-1.1 and jakarta-tomcat-5.0.4 for this tutorial

The framework provides three key components:

• A “request” handler provided by the application developer that is mapped to a standard URI.
• A “response” handler that transfers control to another resource which completes the response.
• A tag library that helps developers create interactive form-based applications with server pages.

The framework’s architecture and tags are buzzword compliant. Struts works well with conventional REST applications and with nouveau technologies like SOAP and AJAX.

Downloading and Configuring Struts

• Download the Struts zip file.
  Start at http://jakarta.apache.org/site/binindex.cgi, or follow the link from http://jakarta.apache.org/struts/. I’m using Struts 1.1 in this tutorial.
• Unzip into a directory of your choice.
  For example, unzip into C:\jakarta-struts-1.1. Throughout the rest of this tutorial, I’ll refer to this location as struts_install_dir.
• Update your CLASSPATH.
  Add struts_install_dir/lib/struts.jar to the CLASSPATH used by your compiler or IDE (not your server). Here are three possible ways of setting it:
  • Set it in your autoexec.bat file. E.g., on Windows if you unzipped into C:\jakarta-struts-1.1, you would add the following to C:\autoexec.bat:
    set CLASSPATH=C:\jakarta-struts-1.1\lib\struts.jar;%CLASSPATH%
    On Unix/Linux, use your .cshrc, .bashrc, or .profile instead.
  • Set it using the system settings. On WinXP, go to the Start menu and select Control Panel, then System, then the Advanced tab, then the Environment Variables button. On Win2K/WinNT, go to the Start menu and select Settings, then Control Panel, then System, then Environment. Either way, enter the CLASSPATH value from the previous bullet.
  • Set it in your editor or IDE. Most IDEs have a way of specifying the JAR files needed to compile projects. Or, you could make a small .bat file (Windows) or shell script (Unix/Linux) that supplies the struts.jar file as the argument to -classpath for javac.
• Install an XML parser.
  If you have JDK 1.4 or Apache Tomcat, this step is not necessary, since they already come with an XML parser. But, if you use JDK 1.2 or 1.3 with another server, you might need to obtain the XML parsing libraries. Here are two good sources:
  • http://xml.apache.org/
  • http://java.sun.com/xml/