Recieve a Map from a HTML form with Thymeleaf

Question

I'm working on a project with Spring Web and Thymeleaf (this is my first time using Thymeleaf) and I have this requirement:

The user needs to see a single form to fill a table with 32 rows and 4 columns, all at once.

Edit. Each row has a fixed key (just for clarification)

My first (naive) approach was to make inputs that look like this

    <th:block th:each="key:{keys}"
      <input th:name="|${key}Val1|" />
      <input th:name="|${key}Val2|" />
      <input th:name="|${key}Val3|" />
      <input th:name="|${key}Val4|" />
    </th:block>

This works well on the HTML side but, on the controller, I have a DTO with all 128 fields

    @PostMapping("/the/path")
    public void saveTable(Model model, @ModelAttribute TableDTO table){
        //ommited
    }

    public class TableDTO {
        private int key1Val1;
        private int key1Val2;
        private int key1Val3;
        private int key1Val4;
        private int key2Val1;
       // and so on for the 128 values
    }

This currently works, but I'm pretty sure there's a better way.

Is there a way I can modify the bindings so I can receive something like this?

    @PostMapping("/the/path")
    public void saveTable(Model model, Map<Key, SimplerDTO> table){
        //ommited
    }

Where Key is an enum and SimplerDTO is a wrapper for the four values?

As said before, this is my first time with Thymeleaf, son any pointer will be well received.

Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

You can get all the post parameters in a single map by including an argument in your PostMapping function saveTable like:

@RequestParam Map<String, String> paramMap

That will have all 256 values for your use.