Question

<%@ taglib uri="http://java.sun.com/jsp/jstl/core" prefix="c"%>
<td colspan="1" width="100">
<c:choose>
  <c:when>
    <c:choose>
       <c:when></c:when><c:otherwise>
    <c:when test="<%=\"F\".equals(result[1]) %>">
     <c:set var="checked"><%=result[0].equals("Y")%></c:set>
     <input type="checkbox" id="<%="ABC"+"$"+rows%>" name="<%="ABC"+"$"+rows%>" value="<%=String.valueOf(rows)%>" ${checked ? 'checked' : ''} onclick="someFunction(this)"/>
    </c:when></c:otherwise>
    </c:choose>
  </c:when>    
  <c:otherwise>
  </c:otherwise>
</c:choose>
</td>

For some reason, the JSP compiler complains that there is no end tag for the <c:when> that nests the input type=”checkbox”…may i know what i’m doing wrong? i tried using <c:if> and it doesnt work either, compiler complains no end tag too.

EDIT: if i dont nest the input type and the set var like below, then it works…but it fails to accomplish my original logic..

    <c:otherwise>
            <c:when test="<%=\"F\".equals(result[1]) %>">
            </c:when>
            <c:set var="checked"><%=result[0].equals("Y")%></c:set>
             <input type="checkbox" id="<%="ABC"+"$"+rows%>" name="<%="ABC"+"$"+rows%>" value="<%=String.valueOf(rows)%>" ${checked ? 'checked' : ''} onclick="someFunction(this)"/>
    </c:otherwise>

EDIT 2: i have to code jsp in this manner on pain of death from my architect lol. any advice will be gladly accepted to retain my proposed logic.

Answer 1

Just get rid of all those scriptlets (the oldschool <% %> things). They don’t mix well with taglibs. The JSTL attributes take EL expressions only.

E.g., assuming that you’ve done a request.setAttribute("results", results) beforehand, which designtechnically needs to be done in a servlet, but can also be done in a scriptlet somewhere in top of JSP.

<c:forEach items="${results}" var="result">
  ...
  <td colspan="1" width="100">
    <c:choose>
      <c:when>
        <c:choose>
          <c:when></c:when>
          <c:otherwise>
            <c:when test="${result[1] == 'F'}">
              <c:set var="checked">${result[0] == 'Y'}</c:set>
              <input type="checkbox" id="ABC$${rows}" name="ABC$${rows}" value="${rows}" ${checked ? 'checked' : ''} onclick="someFunction(this)" />
            </c:when>
          </c:otherwise>
        </c:choose>
      </c:when>    
      <c:otherwise>
      </c:otherwise>
    </c:choose>
  </td>
  ...
</c:forEach>

It’s instantly also much better readable this way.

See also:

• Show JDBC ResultSet in HTML in JSP page using MVC and DAO pattern