How to hide the parameter values in url

Question

I am working on a project using hibernate and Spring MVC architecture. My problem is that I am using (*.htm) url pattern in my web application , in this case when I sent a product's id to controller for editing, the product's id is shown in url for eg.

"localhost:8080/MyApp/editProduct.htm?productId=03".

But I don't want this . I just want

"localhost:8080/MyApp/editProduct.htm?productId" or "localhost:8080/MyApp/editProduct.htm/productId/03" 

and I am unable to use @PathVariable Annotation in my controller because of my url pattern(*.htm) and using of @PathVariable Annotation the JSP page never load properly. Any Suggestions . Thanks in Advance.

Controller:-

@RequestMapping(value = "/{sId}/deleteState.htm")
public ModelAndView deleteState(@PathVariable("sId") int sId ){
    ModelAndView mav = new ModelAndView();
    
    try{
        stateDAO.deleteById(sId);
        mav.addAllObjects(prepapareModel());
        mav.addObject("msg", "State Deleted Succesdfully");
        mav.setViewName("admin/viewState");
        return mav;
    }catch(Exception e){
        e.printStackTrace();
        mav.addAllObjects(prepapareModel());
        mav.addObject("err", "Failed to Delete State");
        mav.setViewName("admin/viewState");
        return mav;
    }
}

public Map prepapareModel(){
    Map map = new HashMap();
    map.put("states", stateDAO.findAll());
    return map;
}

Url after deleting the State from database:-

http://localhost:8080/PujaInBox/10/deleteState.htm

I think the Id of State is creating the problem . 10 is Id of state.

Answer 1

Change servlet default url pattern to:

 <servlet-mapping>
    <servlet-name>servlet_name</servlet-name>
    <url-pattern>/</url-pattern>
</servlet-mapping>

But in this situation better option is to manage your @PathVariables in the middle part of URL, like:

/myapp/product/{productId}/edit.html

Answer 2

If you want to make use of @PathVariable annoation, then URL should be

/MyApp/productId/03/editProduct.htm - ending with your extension and your controller mapping should be like this

@RequestMapping(value="/productId/{id}/editProduct")
public String editProduct(@PathVariable String id, Model model) {

}

One more change to note here is that I mentioned a relative URL instead of absolute URL like localhost:8080/MyApp/productId/03/editProduct.htm including host name and port. This won't work when you deploy your application in an actual server because localhost always refers to your current machine but your application is deployed on some other host.

Hope that makes sense :)

Answer 3

I am doing an assignment in a class.

I am guessing the first step is to use wildcard (*) to map your URL. In your pages, you can use whatever the URL you prefer.

Then you can invoke the method getPathInfo() in your servlet.

String action = request.getPathInfo();

Or you can call getHeader("referer") to get your URL then manipulate your string to get the information you need.

Finally, you can put the string in your if-else or switch statement.

Answer 4

All you have to do is create a form in your html page with method=post

<form method="post">

Then create fields inside this form and if you don't have any fields that should be displayed used input with type hidden.

<input type="hidden" name="parametername" id="parameterid" value="parametervalue">

This will do the trick, it won't show any parameter value in the URL and you can access the values as you already do.

Hope this helps....