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POIn Spring/JSP, where should formatting be performed?
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  1. POIn Spring/JSP, where should formatting be performed?
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    copied!<p>I'm using Spring, but this question applies to all JSP-controller type designs.</p> <p>The JSP page references data (using tags) which is populated by the corresponding controller. My question is, where is the appropriate place to perform formatting, in JSP or the controller?</p> <p>So far I've been preparing the data by formatting it in my controller.</p> <pre><code>public class ViewPersonController extends org.springframework.web.servlet.mvc.AbstractController { private static final Format MY_DATE_FORMAT = new SimpleDateFormat(...); protected ModelAndView handleRequestInternal(HttpServletRequest request, HttpServletResponse response) { Person person = get person from backing service layer or database Map properties = new HashMap(); // No formatting required, name is a String properties.put("name", person.getName()); // getBirthDate() returns Date and is formatted by a Format properties.put("birthDate", MY_DATE_FORMAT.format(person.getBirthDate())); // latitude and longitude are separate fields in Person, but in the UI it's one field properties.put("location", person.getLatitude() + ", " + person.getLongitude()); return new ModelAndView("viewPerson", "person", properties); } } </code></pre> <p>The JSP file would look something like:</p> <pre><code>Name = &lt;c:out value="${person. name}" /&gt;&lt;br&gt; Birth Date = &lt;c:out value="${person. birthDate}" /&gt;&lt;br&gt; Location = &lt;c:out value="${person. location}" /&gt;&lt;br&gt; </code></pre> <p>I know that JSP does have some provisions for formatting,</p> <pre><code>&lt;%@ taglib uri="http://java.sun.com/jstl/fmt" prefix="fmt" %&gt; &lt;fmt:formatDate type="date" value="${person. birthDate}" /&gt; </code></pre> <p>But this only works with Java's <code>java.util.Format</code>. What if I need more complex or computed values. In such a case putting the code in the JSP would be cumbersome (and ugly).</p> <p>I'm curious if this is following the spirit Spring/JSP/MVC. In other words, is the controller part of the view? Where is the preferred place to perform view related formatting? Should my controller just be returning the object (Person) instead of a Map of formatted values?</p>
 

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