Using simple Tiles redirection

[Elie Hirschman]

This was a bit of a stumper until one of us found a solution:

The problem: Want to set up a link to a plain ol� JSP page within a framework which uses Tiles and Spring. But how much effort do we need to expend to create this seemingly simple link?

The Solution: use UrlFilenameViewController as a �default controller� which will simply forward on to the appropriately named Tiles definition.

The Implementation: We have a jsp called prlsite_tool.jsp, to which we wish to link from our page menu.jsp. First, set up a Tiles definition for this jsp page:

<definition name="site.mainLayout" path="/WEB-INF/jsp/admin/layouts/adminLayout.jsp">
        <put name="title" value="PROPS Administration Site" type="String" />
        <put name="header" value="/WEB-INF/jsp/admin/header.jsp" />
        <put name="messages" value="/WEB-INF/jsp/admin/messages.jsp" />
        <put name="menu" value="/WEB-INF/jsp/admin/menu.jsp" />
        <put name="footer" value="/WEB-INF/jsp/admin/footer.jsp" />
</definition>
<definition name="prlsite_tool" extends="site.mainLayout">
<put name="title" value="PROPS: Manage PRLSite cached Data" type="String" />
<put name="body" value="/WEB-INF/jsp/admin/prlsite_tool.jsp" />
</definition>

Next, in the Spring config, enable a default controller instance:

<bean id="defaultController" class="org.springframework.web.servlet.mvc.UrlFilenameViewController">
</bean>

Now, add a URL matching pattern which will catch the link to the new page:

  <bean id="urlMapping" class="org.springframework.web.servlet.handler.SimpleUrlHandlerMapping">
        <property name="mappings">
            <props>
                <prop key="/admin/minimums/*.spring">eventMinimumUpdateForm</prop>
                <prop key="/admin/configuration/config.spring">configurationForm</prop>
                <prop key="/admin/permissions/*">permissionForm</prop>
                <prop key="/admin/lms/linens.spring">linenController</prop>
                <prop key="/admin/lms/manufacturers.spring">manufacturerController</prop>
                <prop key="/admin/*.spring">defaultController</prop>
            </props>
        </property>
  </bean>

Now, any links to �/admin/somethingsomething.spring� will be forwarded to a somethingsomething.jsp under the /admin path� which is exactly what we want! Last step is to put in the link on the menu page:

<tr valign="middle">
        <td />
        <td><a href="/admin/prlsite_tool.spring">Manage PRL Site Caches</a></td>
</tr>