Question

This [servlet or jsp] must return an XML document [for future processing by my web-app].
That is not intended for end-users.

What is a better design: write a JSP or an XML ?

p.s. What I don’t like about jsp is that every system admin can see your java code.

p.p.s If that’d be a jsp, than it must be capable to be autowired by Spring. Is it as easy to do as with servlets?

Answer 1

I would use a servlet for this in combination with a Javabean-to-XML serializer, such as XStream, XMLBeans, etc.

XStream is pretty easy:

protected void doGet(HttpServletRequest request, HttpServletResponse response) throws ServletException, IOException {
    Person person = personDAO.find(request.getParameter("personId"));
    response.setContentType("text/xml");
    response.setCharacterEncoding("UTF-8");
    new XStream().toXML(person, response.getWriter());
}

No need to hassle with template text, so also no need for JSP.