validations in struts

[haritha hari]

Hai friends,

I am working on struts validation

validation.xml file is

<!DOCTYPE form-validation PUBLIC
"-//Apache Software Foundation//DTD Commons
Validator Rules Configuration 1.3.0//EN"
"http://jakarta.apache.org/commons/dtds/validator_1_3_0.dtd">
<form-validation>
	<formset>
		<form name="loginform">
			<field property="firstname" depends="required">
				<arg key="loginform.firstname"></arg>
			</field>
			<field property="password" depends="required">
				<arg key="loginform.password"></arg>
			</field>
			<field property="year" depends="required,date														">
				<arg position="0" key="prompt.year"></arg>
				<var>
					<var-name>datePattern</var-name>
					<var-value>MM/dd/YYYY</var-value>
				</var>	
			</field>
			<field property="email" depends="required,email">
				<arg key="loginform.email"></arg>
			</field>
		</form>
		
	</formset>
</form-validation>

And my action form is

package beenpack;

import javax.servlet.http.HttpServletRequest;

import org.apache.struts.action.ActionErrors;
import org.apache.struts.action.ActionForm;
import org.apache.struts.action.ActionMapping;
import org.apache.struts.action.ActionMessage;
import org.apache.struts.action.ActionMessages;
import org.apache.struts.validator.ValidatorForm;


@SuppressWarnings("serial")
public class loginform extends ValidatorForm{
	
	private String firstname;
	private String secondname;
	private String email;
	private String password;
	private String repassword;
	private String year;
	private String city;
	private String mobile;
	private String degree;
	private String per;

	public String getdegree(){
		return degree;
	}
	public String getrepassword(){
		return repassword;
	}
	public String getper(){
		return per;
	}
	public String getfirstname(){
		return firstname;
	}
	public String getsecondname(){
		return secondname;
	}
	public String getemail(){
		return email;
	}
	public String getpassword(){
		return password;
	}
	public String getyear(){
		return year;
	}
	public String getcity(){
		return city;
	}
	public String getmobile(){
		return mobile;
	}
	public void setfirstname(String str){
		this.firstname=str;
	}
	public void setsecondname(String str){
		this.secondname=str;
	}
	public void setemail(String str){
		this.email=str;
	}
	public void setpassword(String str){
		this.password=str;
	}
	public void setcity(String str){
		this.city=str;
	}
	public void setmobile(String str){
		this.mobile=str;
	}
	public void setper(String str){
		this.per=str;
	}
	public void setdegree(String str){
		this.degree=str;
	}
	public void setrepassword(String str){
		this.repassword=str;
	}
	 public void reset(ActionMapping mapping, HttpServletRequest request) {
			this.firstname=null;
			this.password=null;
			
	    }
	 public ActionErrors validate( 
				ActionMapping mapping, HttpServletRequest request ) {
				ActionErrors errors = new ActionErrors();
				
				boolean t;
				t=(getpassword().matches(getrepassword()));
				System.out.println("value of t is :"+t);
				if( getfirstname() == null || getfirstname().length() < 1 ) {
					errors.add("name",new ActionMessage("error.name.required"));
				}
				if( getpassword() == null || getpassword().length() < 6 ) {
					errors.add("password",new ActionMessage("error.password.required"));
				}
				if(!t){
				     errors.add("password", new ActionMessage("error.repassword.valid"));	
				}
				if(getemail().indexOf('@')==-1||getemail().indexOf('.')==-1){
					errors.add("email",new ActionMessage("error.email.valid"));
				}
				if(getper()==null){
					errors.add("percentage",new ActionMessage("error.percentage.range"));
				}
				
				return errors;
		}
}

For validating we are use validate.xml file right...?
but why we need to use validate method in action form

please tell me......

thanq in advance

[Joe Ess]

haritha hari wrote: why we need to use validate method in action form

You do not. I find it useful to do simple validation with XML validation (see if a required field is filled in) and more complex validation in the Java code (make sure a field is in a set of values).
You can also create your own validators to take care of more complex cases.

[Shailesh Kumar Saxena]

Hi Haritha

As i know, we use validate.xml (or any name like validator-user.xml....) to configure the dynamic validator plugin generated validation rules.
Struts supplied validator plugin provides approx 14 validation rules. But moreover if we need our manual validation rules along with validator
plugin supplied validation rules then for this purpose we can write our own logic in action form class validate(--) method.
If you are in no need of your own manually developed validation rules, there is no need of taking the validate(--) method in your action form class.

I hope this will help you