No .. that is not the way it works...
If person bean dosen't exits then only <jsp:setProperty> tag executes and
repleces the existing property. But by the example mention above it sets the
person bean in the
request scope,
so <jsp:setProperty> not executes..
But if you use <jsp:getProperty> which is not inside the <jsp:useBean> tag (not based on condition) it executes and get you the value of the mention property, in this case value of
name property, if it got some value. means existing value of the name property.
Hope this help you