How to include a JSP page into a custom tag

I am creating a custom tag directive where I have to print a table of data from database.

So far I have created:

JSP page:

 <%@taglib uri="/WEB-INF/tlds/fact.tld" prefix="veritis"%>
<html>
    <head>
        <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8">
        <title>JSP Page</title>
    </head>
    <body>       
        <h1><veritis:print name="emp" /></h1> 
    </body>
</html>

TLD file:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<taglib version="2.1" xmlns="http://java.sun.com/xml/ns/javaee"
 xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance" xsi:schemaLocation="http://java.sun.com/xml/ns/javaee http://java.sun.com/xml/ns/javaee/web-jsptaglibrary_2_1.xsd">
 <tlib-version>1.0</tlib-version>
 <short-name>factorial</short-name>
  <tag>
      <name>print</name>
      <tag-class>com.veritis.jsp.FactTag</tag-class>
      <body-content>empty</body-content>
    <attribute>
        <name>name</name>
        <required>false</required>
    </attribute>
  </tag>
</taglib>

and a Class file for which fetches data from database using other Class file. This class file also extends TagSupport to overwrite needed TLD methods.

public class FactTag extends TagSupport{
    String value="emp";
    public String getValue() {
        return value;    }

    public void setValue(String value) {
        this.value = value;
    }
    public int doStartTag(){
        return Tag.SKIP_BODY;
    }
    public int doEndTag() throws JspTagException{

        String emp1=getValue();
            
       try{
           //The following line is to get the JSP Writer Object
           //similar to PrintWriter in Servlet
           JspWriter out=pageContext.getOut();
           
           TableData tbd=new TableData();
           List<Employee> listOfEmp=tbd.getAllEMployees();
           for(Employee emp:listOfEmp)
           {
               System.out.println(emp);
           }
       }catch(Exception e){}
       return Tag.SKIP_PAGE;
    }
   
}

Now I have data in my List<emp> and I want to print that in JSP file. I could print that by using out object but my requirement is not to use out object rather print by including other JSP file or any other way.

Note: Though I am taking input(emp) from JSP, I am not using it for now. Rather I am generating a static query to fetch the data.

Solution

You can use JSTL c:forEach tag to iterate through the list of Employee. If you don't want to use frameworks based on servlets like Struts2 or Spring MVC, you can use raw servlet

@WebServlet("/employees")
public class HomeServlet extends HttpServlet {
    private static final long serialVersionUID = 1L;

    protected void doGet(HttpServletRequest request, HttpServletResponse response) throws ServletException, IOException {
        TableData tbd=new TableData();
        List<Employee> listOfEmp=tbd.getAllEMployees();        
        request.setAttribute("listOfEmp", listOfEmp);

        RequestDispatcher rd = getServletContext().getRequestDispatcher("/emloyee.jsp");
        rd.forward(request, response);
    }

}

employee.jsp:

<%@ page language="java" contentType="text/html; charset=UTF-8"
    pageEncoding="UTF-8"%>
<%@ taglib uri="http://java.sun.com/jsp/jstl/core" prefix="c" %>
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<title>JSP Page</title>
<style>
table,th,td
{
border:1px solid black;
}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<%-- Using JSTL c:forEach and c:out to loop a list and display items in a table --%>
<table>
<tbody>
<tr><th>ID</th><th>Name</th><th>Role</th></tr>
<c:forEach items="${requestScope.listOfEmp}" var="emp">
<tr><td><c:out value="${emp.id}"></c:out></td>
<td><c:out value="${emp.name}"></c:out></td>
<td><c:out value="${emp.role}"></c:out></td></tr>
</c:forEach>
</tbody>
</table>
<br><br>
</body>
</html>

You can also use JSP fragment page containing a table and include it to the main page.

employee.jsp:

<%@ page language="java" contentType="text/html; charset=UTF-8"
    pageEncoding="UTF-8"%>
<%@ taglib uri="http://java.sun.com/jsp/jstl/core" prefix="c" %>
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<title>JSP Page</title>
<style>
table,th,td
{
border:1px solid black;
}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<c:import url="employee_table.jsp"/>
<br><br>
</body>
</html>

employee_table.jsp:

<%@ page language="java" contentType="text/html; charset=UTF-8"
    pageEncoding="UTF-8"%>
<%@ taglib uri="http://java.sun.com/jsp/jstl/core" prefix="c" %>
<%-- Using JSTL c:forEach and c:out to loop a list and display items in a table --%>
<table>
<tbody>
<tr><th>ID</th><th>Name</th><th>Role</th></tr>
<c:forEach items="${requestScope.listOfEmp}" var="emp">
<tr><td><c:out value="${emp.id}"></c:out></td>
<td><c:out value="${emp.name}"></c:out></td>
<td><c:out value="${emp.role}"></c:out></td></tr>
</c:forEach>
</tbody>
</table>