Display Tag Export Example in JSP – Issue Fix Java Tutorial

Display tag provides export options to export page into PDF, CSV, Excel
and XML in Java web application written using JSP, Servlet, Struts or Spring
MVC framework. Display tag is a tag library and you just need to use it in your
JSP page to display tabular data or generate HTML tables dynamically. Earlier
we have seen 10 display tag tips for
getting most out of display tag and in this JSP Servlet tutorial we will see
one display tag export issue, which prevent display tag export functionality to
work properly. Display tag experience is considered good in various JSP Interview and some
questions related to sorting, paging, both internal paging and external paging
and exporting on display tag also appear as various J2EE and Servlet Interview questions.
In my opinion, after JSTL core tag library,
display tag is most popular tag library and every Servlet and JSP developer
should familiar with display tag.

Display tag Export Example

In order to enable export functionality in display tag, configure display
tag in JSP as shown below. I believe this is the most easiest way to include
export functionality in Java web application.

uid="UserDetailsScreen" name="sessionScope.userList" defaultsort="1" defaultorder="ascending" pagesize="10"  export ="true" requestURI="/SpringTest/displaytag.jsp">

    property="userId" sortable="true" title="Employee ID" maxLength="25" />

    property="name" sortable="true" title="Real Name" maxLength="25" />

    property="email"  title="Email Address" maxLength="25" />

    property="phone"  title="Phone" maxLength="25" /> 


 

    name="basic.empty.showtable" value="true" />

    name="paging.banner.group_size" value="10" />

    name="paging.banner.item_name" value="user" />

    name="paging.banner.item_names" value="users" />

 

export="true" option  enable export functionality in displaytag. You
also need to include corresponding libraries like :

displaytag-export-poi-1.2.jar , itext-1.3.jar, poi-3.2.jar etc. to
export HTML table into Microsoft Excel, PDF , CSV and XML format. In next section we
will see a common display tag export issue which can break export functionality
in your Java web application.

Displaytag Export Issue

After enabling display tag export functionality, though it was working in
test program, export option on display tag for CSV, PDF, Excel and XML was not
working on actual project. Display tag was throwing following error message, when
user clicks on export button :

"Unable to reset response before returning exported
data. You are not using an export filter. Be sure that no other jsp tags are
used before display:table or refer to the displaytag documentation on how to
configure the export filter"

Cause
of Display tag export problem:

We are using Spring security for LDAP authentication
and controlling concurrent active session
in Java web application. Spring security framework uses filters to implement
security features and has following filter declared in web.xml

        springSecurityFilterChain

        org.springframework.web.filter.DelegatingFilterProxy





        springSecurityFilterChain

        /*

I think you won't face this display tag export issue until you are using
any filter in your web.xml file. As I haven't
seen this before adding Spring security support in web application and export
option of displaytag was working even without this configuration.

How to
fix Display tag export issue:

You can use following steps to fix display tag export issue in your Java
web application :

1) Add ResponseOverrideFilter filter as shown below.

        ResponseOverrideFilter

        org.displaytag.filter.ResponseOverrideFilter





       ResponseOverrideFilter

       *.htm

Make sure your filter mapping is correct i.e. if your URL pattern is
ending with *.jsp then use that or if you using Struts and your URL pattern is
using *.do or *.action than specify accordingly. I was
using Spring MVC framework which uses ViewResolver design pattern
to resolve view e.g. JSP and we have configured it to listen .htm extension.

2) Make sure that display tag's ResponseOverrideFilter must be first
filter in web.xml

That’s all on How to fix display tag export issue in Java web
application. As discussed in 10 display tag example with JSP and Spring,
display tag is most easy way to generate tables from JSP based web application.
It also most easy way to enable export functionality which seamlessly allows user
to export table’s content into PDF, CSV, XML and Microsoft Excel files. 

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Source:http://javarevisited.blogspot.com/2013/01/display-tag-export-example-in-jsp-issue-fix-tutorial.html