Multiple form values with the same name (checkboxes, etc)

[stateofmind]

This is the first true stumbling block I've hit with Spring, and I'm sure there is a simple way around it.

I have a form where a user can edit an employee, and using checkboxes you can assign what departments she/he
belongs to.

How can you use spring:bind when you have multiple form values with the same name?

I want it, so when the user goes in to edit an employee, it will build the list of departments, and check the ones the employee belongs to.

I hope this makes sense.

Thanks in advance for your time,

Josh

[uze]

Unfortunately, there's no built-in way (I'm aware of) for this issue. You'll have to override the onBind() method and put some code in it to extract the parameters straight from the request like this:

protected void onBind(HttpServletRequest request, Object command, BindException errors) {

    String[] employees = request.getParameterValues("_employee");

    // instanciate and set employees in model...

}

Note that if you specify the same name for the parameter and the spring:bind you will receive an error because Spring will try to convert a string to you object type (hence the "_").

Uze