How to get a character from a html to a servlet

Question

<form action="registerServlet">
   <tr>
        <td>Gender:</td>
        <td><select name="gender" id="gender" required>
            <option disabled selected> -- select an option -- </option>
            <option value="M">Male</option>
            <option value="F">Female</option>
            </select></td>
    </tr>   
</form>

This is the html code in which I have to select the gender of a registering person Now in the registerServlet I want get the gender by using getparameter() code for that is

private char gender;
gender=request.getParameter("gender");

But this is giving an error in eclipse. Can anyone help me how to get a character from the html page

Answer 1

request.getParameter() returns String. You need to do this:

private String param;
param=request.getParameter("gender");

private char gender;
gender=param.charAt(0);

OR

private char gender;
gender=request.getParameter("gender").charAt(0);

Handle null checks if necessary.