url encoding in java?

Question

I want to know that what is url encoding. I have 2 jsp pages and one servlet. When I run the application the url displayed is :

http://localhost:8080/myproject/index.jsp

where

index.jsp :

<form action="Myservlet" method="post">
    <input type="text" name="mytext" id="mytext"/>
    <input type="submit" value="submit"/>
</form>

after the submit button is clicked the URL displayed is :

http://localhost:8080/myproject/Myservlet

What is the meaning of URL encoding? How can I encode url?

From index.jsp goes to Myservlet then to result.jsp

Myservet#doPost // Do I need to do URL encoding here? If yes how ?

  fetching data from db.......
  ....................
  String nextJSP = "/result.jsp";
  RequestDispatcher dispatcher = getServletContext().getRequestDispatcher(nextJSP);
  dispatcher.forward(request,response);

result.jsp

displays data here

Did you even try to google it? en.wikipedia.org/wiki/URL_Encoding — home
– home, Commented Apr 23, 2012 at 7:52
Possible duplicate: stackoverflow.com/questions/8713208/… (See the 2nd response) — blackcompe
– blackcompe, Commented Apr 23, 2012 at 7:53
ya i googled but i did n't get answers to my question...there i found confusing topics and not coming near to my question..if you know then please help me little bit by posting your answer, how can i encode url? — sujit
– sujit, Commented Apr 23, 2012 at 7:55

blackcompe · Accepted Answer · 2012-04-23 08:16:24Z

7

There are two types of encoding: HTML form encoding and URL re-writing.

In form encoding, the URL string is converted into a valid ASCII format that's Internet-ready. From the URLEncoder.encode(String, String) docs:

Translates a string into application/x-www-form-urlencoded format using a specific encoding scheme. This method uses the supplied encoding scheme to obtain the bytes for unsafe characters.

The second kind is URL rewriting. The URL string is encoded with a session id in case the client browser doesn't support (or has disabled) cookies or session tracking. From the HttpServletResponse.encodeURL(String) docs:

Encodes the specified URL by including the session ID in it, or, if encoding is not needed, returns the URL unchanged. The implementation of this method includes the logic to determine whether the session ID needs to be encoded in the URL. For example, if the browser supports cookies, or session tracking is turned off, URL encoding is unnecessary.

answered Apr 23, 2012 at 8:16

blackcompe

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5 Comments

sujit Over a year ago

thanks blackcompe for your answer...so in form in index.jsp, should i write like this: <form action="Myservlet?some encoding"> ?

blackcompe Over a year ago

@sujit: What type of encoding do you want to do? Form or re-writing?

sujit Over a year ago

@blackcompe.....i want URL encoding not form encoding, how can i encode urlhttp://localhost:8080/myproject/index.jsp? so that it will be protected from vulnerable attacks?

blackcompe Over a year ago

@sujit: Form Encoding: <form action="<%= new URLEncoder().encode(myURL, "UTF-8") %>">, URL-re-writing: <form action="<%= request.encodeURL(myURL) %>">.

blackcompe Over a year ago

Neither of these will help protect you against attacks. That's completely off topic.

Community · Accepted Answer · 2017-05-23 12:18:01Z

2

I think you have misundersting here. Neither HTML Form Encoding nor URL Re-writing is for what you want to achieve.

If you want to achieve like .

For example: instead of typing http://localhost:8080/search.jsp?xxx the user would see http:/localhost:8080/search?xxx

You can create a servlet mapping like this:

<servlet-mapping>
   <servlet-name>MappingServlet</servlet-name>
   <url-pattern>path/*</url-pattern>
 </servlet-mapping>

The url-pattern must be edited to suit your needs. You need of course to create the servlet in order to map the url to the actual jsp. This technique is used by most of the MVC frameworks.

Read More on How to develop JSP/Servlets Web App using MVC pattern?

edited May 23, 2017 at 12:18

CommunityBot

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answered Apr 23, 2012 at 8:54

Hardik Mishra

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2 Comments

sujit Over a year ago

thanks Hardik for your answer..servlet is coming fine i.e. localhost:8080/search but for jsp how can i display like this: localhost:8080/search (not 8080/search.jsp)? can i do something in web.xml?

Sorter Over a year ago

Just like we map servlets to url in web.xml, you have to map jsp page with a particular url pattern in web.xml.

Dave Cousineau · Accepted Answer · 2014-07-20 05:42:07Z

1

Use java.net.URLEncoder.encode(s, "UTF-8") where s is the string to encode.

This is required whenever we send text as path segments, query string arguments, etc...

Example: see the documentation

edited Jul 20, 2014 at 5:42

Dave Cousineau

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answered Jul 10, 2014 at 22:42

Jose Manuel Gomez Alvarez

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