Question

If a struts 2 action class have a property of

List<User> userList.

And the user class has properties like

username, password, createdDate etc.

Is it possible to make struts populate the list by passing the appropriate JSON string, while submitting a jQuery ajax request pointed at that action.

If it is possible how? Specially how will the JSON string have to look like?

Please ask any clarifications.

EDIT : I’m sorry if I wasn’t clear enough. What I want to do is not get data from Action to a JSP, or submit a form to populate the data. I want to submit a AJAX request with JSON data which Struts 2 can use to automatically populate the List in the Action class.

Not submit the form with AJAX.

Answer 1

1. you should define your action result type="json" and check you have json plugin on your classpath, make sure you have

   <struts>
       <package name="your_package" extends="struts-default, json default" namespace="/">
       // your action here
       </pacakge>
       ...
   </struts>
   

2. edit your action class like this

   public class myAction extends ActionSupport {
       private List<User> userlist; // getter and setter
       public String execute() {
          // your moves
          return SUCCESS;
       }
   }
   

3. then you can do some on your jsp page to show the result like:

   <s:iterator list="userList">
     <s:property value="username"/>
     <s:property value="password"/>
     <s:property value="createdDate"/>
   <s:iterator>
   

I hope this can help you..

UPDATE

if you have already a json object:

{
   "userList" : [
      {"username" : "username", "password" : "afgasdfa", "createdDate" : "date-in-format"},
      {"username" : "username", "password" : "afgasdfa", "createdDate" : "date-in-format"},
      {"username" : "username", "password" : "afgasdfa", "createdDate" : "date-in-format"},
      {"username" : "username", "password" : "afgasdfa", "createdDate" : "date-in-format"}
   ]
}

this should be the format.

then you should get this object from your action class with List<User> userList

just try it and feedback.

UPDATE 2

maybe you should get your json object using String, then convert it to Java Object using:

String stringObject; // which get your string from http
List<User> userList;

userList = (List<User>)JSON.deserialize(stringObject,List<User>.class);

Please feedback again.