Accessing a Map with Struts

Can you access individual Map elements in struts JSP tags?

I have a map of employees that need to be displayed on a page. The problem is that these employees cannot be displayed in any order. I have a set order they must be displayed (based on their jobs).

So is there any way (sort of converting the Map to a Collection) that I could access individual elements via the key within the JSP? (Java in the JSP is undesirable as well)

Thanks!

Have your employee class implement Comparator to sort on the job field and use a TreeMap, then you can just iterate through the map.

First of all, you might consider using a different implementation of the java.util.Map interface. A java.util.LinkedHashMap will retrieve entries in the order they were added just like an ArrayList does. If you want a map that is always in key order, use java.util.TreeMap.

In answer to your question: Yes, you can access maps by keys using Struts tags. example:

HashMap myMap is a property of myForm:

"one", 1
"two", 2
"three", 3

<bean:write name="myForm" property='myMap("one")' />

This expression evaluates to 1.
[ September 01, 2006: Message edited by: Merrill Higginson ]

Thanks for the input. And believe me, I would love to go the Comparator or Linked paths but due to the way the data is coming in, I can't guarantee I'll be putting it in the Map in the correct order nor can I order them manually.

Thanks for the sample, thats what I'll be doing.