Question

How can I obtain the same behavior as String.format(String, Object …) in a JSP(x) page?
Is there a tag library / function library yet available for this purpose?
I need something that given a source string and a set of arguments performs the substitutions like

<ns:tag source="Hi {0} {1}" arguments="'name','surname'" />

or

${ns:func("Hi {0} {1}", "'name','surname'")}

that results in

Hi name surname

Thanks you for any suggestion,
Stefano

Answer 1

You’re looking for the JSTL <fmt:message> tag:

<fmt:message key="the.message.key">
    <fmt:param value="name"/>
    <fmt:param value="surname"/>
</fmt:message>

It uses java.text.MessageFormat internally, though.

Most UI frameworks also have their own version of such a tag.