Question

I have a very strange error of password being displayed as label when form validation fails on other form elements (not the password input textbox itself). The code for the view is below.

<s:if test="%{username == null}">
    <form method="post" enctype="multipart/form-data"
        action="manageUser_create.action">
</s:if>
<s:else>
<form method="post" enctype="multipart/form-data"
        action="manageUser_update.action">
</s:else>       
        <div>
            <s:textfield name="firstName" key="First Name"  cssClass="text-input" />
            <br class="clear" />                
            <s:textfield name="lastName" key="Last Name" cssClass="text-input" />
            <br class="clear" />                
            <s:file name="practiceLogo" id="practiceLogo" key="Upload Logo" cssClass="text-input" />
            <br class="clear" />
            <s:if test="%{username == null}">
                <s:textfield name="username" id="username"  key="Username" cssClass="text-input" />
                <br class="clear" />
            </s:if>
            <s:else>
                <s:hidden name="username"></s:hidden>
            </s:else>

            <s:password name="password"  key="Password" cssClass="text-input" />
            <br class="clear" />
            <s:textfield name="email" cssClass="text-input" key="Email Address" />                  
            <br class="clear" />
            <s:textfield name="replyToEmail" key="Reply To Email" cssClass="text-input" />                  
            <br class="clear" />
            <s:submit align="center" value="Save" id="submitButton" cssClass="btn btn-primary" />
        </div>
    </form>

The action uses annotation for validation as below –

@Validations(requiredStrings = {
        @RequiredStringValidator(type = ValidatorType.FIELD, shortCircuit=true, fieldName = "firstName", key = "opd.error.name.required"),
        @RequiredStringValidator(type = ValidatorType.FIELD, shortCircuit=true, fieldName = "lastName", key = "opd.error.name.required"),
        @RequiredStringValidator(type = ValidatorType.FIELD, shortCircuit=true, fieldName = "username", key = "opd.error.username.required"),
        @RequiredStringValidator(type = ValidatorType.FIELD, shortCircuit=true, fieldName = "password", key = "opd.error.password.required"),
        @RequiredStringValidator(type = ValidatorType.FIELD, shortCircuit=true, fieldName = "email", key = "opd.error.email.required"),
        @RequiredStringValidator(type = ValidatorType.FIELD, shortCircuit=true, fieldName = "replyToEmail", key = "opd.error.email.required")
        },
        emails = {          
        @EmailValidator(type = ValidatorType.FIELD, shortCircuit=true, fieldName = "email", key = "opd.error.email.format"),
        @EmailValidator(type = ValidatorType.FIELD, shortCircuit=true, fieldName = "replyToEmail", key = "opd.error.email.format")})
public String update() {

When I don’t enter password, the validation fails just like it should and then I see the correct message above the Password label and textbox. This works fine.

What does not work is if I enter password but leave out something else, like reply to email. Instead of the Password label being display, the password itself gets displayed where it should say “Password:”. For example, if the password is abcd, then abcd gets displayed as a label.

EDIT
This seems like a serious bug. If the attribute “key” of password is changed to anything other than Password or password, it gets displayed as the label.
Struts 2 version: 2.2.1

Answer 1

I found the workaround.

Using the attribute “label” instead of “key” in the Password field fixes this issue.

So

<s:password name="password"  key="Password" cssClass="text-input" />

needs to be changed to

<s:password name="password" label="Password" cssClass="text-input" />

Seems very strange though because all other fields work with key.