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JSP Tag Libraries : Chapter 3: Developing your first tags

3. 6 Summary

What are custom tags? Why use them? Custom tags are unique JSP compo-nents that make it easy to integrate portions of Java logic into a JSP file in an easy-to-use, well-recognized for-mat. Custom tags also answer to well-known API and life cycle definitions (to be discussed in chapter 4) that make it clear how tags behave in any development or runtime environment.

Why use custom tags? Custom tags represent a great way to separate the business logic and presentation, thus enhancing manageability and reducing overall maintenance costs. Another benefit is their ease of use. By using tag syntax, many of the scriptlets and other portions of Java code associated with the classic JSP programming are no longer needed, and the JSP development can be opened to content (commonly, HTML) developers.

We also discussed the mechanics related to tag development, and saw that it is not so difficult to develop simple, but useful, tags. This chapter provided a solid foundation for you to start developing custom JSP tags. It presented four important tools that you will use in your daily tag development:

• How to configure a simple (and free) development environment with which you can compile and test your tags. .
• How to develop, compile, and test simple tags using this development environment.
• How to write a TLD file to describe your tag's runtime behavior and attributes. .
• How to package your tag library in a distributable .jar file.

If you have a lot of questions at this point, that's good. We've only lightly touched on many of the nuances of tag development in order to help you get started right away. In the next chapters, we will dive in and explore more fully each of the topics presented here.

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