Multiple Select Not Saving Data

[Lindsey]

Hi all,

This is probably really basic but I can't find any other posts or examples using this.

I originally had a form with a list of 'properties' (aka clients) in a simple single form:select and everything worked fine. Then I found I needed to make it a many-to-many relationship so I updated the hibernate mapping and pojo getter/setter methods to allow assigning it that way.

Now it lists the properties in the multiple select but no matter how many I select when I post the data the controller doesn't see anything selected but saves the other form data. When I manually add some inventory -> property links in the DB the edit form does select them when the view is rendered so my getter and property editor must be working fine.

Here's the code snippits. I think the problem lies in my POJO getter/setters as I followed the petclinic example app for the many-to-many relationship but they don't have it saving data, only retrieving.

Hibernate Mapping...

		<set name="propertiesInternal" table="inventory_x_property" schema="tvi">
			<key column="inventory_fk"/>
			<many-to-many column="property_fk" class="ovm.centraltvi.Property"/>
		</set>

Database Example...

 inventory_x_property_pk | inventory_fk | property_fk
-------------------------+--------------+-------------
                       1 |           39 |         116
                       2 |           39 |         160
(2 rows)

POJO...

public class Inventory extends BaseEntity {

	static Log log = LogFactory.getLog(Inventory.class);
	
	private TV tv;
	private Set<Property> properties;
	private String serial;
	private Set<InventoryHistory> inventoryHistory;

	protected Set<Property> getPropertiesInternal() {
		if (this.properties == null) {
			this.properties = new HashSet<Property>();
		}
		log.info("-- IN Inventory GetPropertiesInternal -- with selected properties: " + this.properties.size());
		return this.properties;
	}

	protected void setPropertiesInternal(Set<Property> properties) {
		log.info("-- IN Inventory SetPropertiesInternal -- with selected properties: " + properties.size());
		this.properties = properties;
	}
	
	public List<Property> getProperties() {
		List<Property> sortedHistory = new ArrayList<Property>(getPropertiesInternal());
		PropertyComparator.sort(sortedHistory, new MutableSortDefinition("name", true, false));
		log.info("-- IN Inventory GetProperties -- with selected properties: " + sortedHistory.size());
		return Collections.unmodifiableList(sortedHistory);
	}
	
	public void setProperties(Set<Property> properties) {
		log.info("-- IN Inventory SetProperties -- with selected properties: " + properties.size());
		setPropertiesInternal(properties);
	}
	
	public Integer getPropertiesLength() {
		log.info("-- IN Inventory getPropertiesLength -- with selected properties: " + this.properties.size());
		return this.properties.size();
	}

	public void addProperties(Property property) {
		log.info("-- IN Inventory addProperties: " + property.getName());
		getPropertiesInternal().add(property);
	}	

...... other members .....

}

Controller...

-at-Controller
-at-RequestMapping("/inventoryAdd.do")
-at-SessionAttributes("inventory")
public class InventoryAddForm {
	
	static Log log = LogFactory.getLog(InventoryAddForm.class);
	private final TVI tvi;
	
	-at-Autowired
	public InventoryAddForm(TVI tvi) {
		this.tvi = tvi;
	}
	
	-at-ModelAttribute("tvs")
	public Collection<TV> populateTVs() {
		return this.tvi.getTVs();
	}
	
	-at-ModelAttribute("properties")
	public Collection<Property> populateProperties() {
		return this.tvi.getProperties();
	}
	
	-at-RequestMapping(method = RequestMethod.GET)
	public String setupForm(Model model) {
		
		model.addAttribute("inventory", new Inventory());
		return "inventoryForm";
	}
	
	-at-RequestMapping(method = RequestMethod.POST)
	public String processSubmit(-at-ModelAttribute("inventory") Inventory inventory, BindingResult result, Model model, SessionStatus status) {

		log.info("Attempting to add inventory: [" + inventory.getTv().getId() + "] " + inventory.getTv().getMakeModel());
		
		log.info("Properties Selected Count: " + inventory.getPropertiesLength());
		
		java.util.List<Property> props = inventory.getProperties();
		
		for (int i = 0; i < inventory.getPropertiesLength(); i++)
			log.info("Property found at " + i + " = " + props.get(i));
		
		new InventoryValidator().validate(inventory, result);
		
		if (result.hasErrors()) {
			
			log.info("Failed adding inventory due to validation errors.");
			return "inventoryForm";
		}
		else {
			
			log.info("Storing inventory.");
			this.tvi.storeInventory(inventory);
			status.setComplete();
			log.info("Returning with inventory id: " + inventory.getId());
			return "redirect:inventoryEdit.do?inventoryId=" + inventory.getId();
		}
	}

}

Custom property editor:

public class PropertyEditor extends PropertyEditorSupport {

	static Log log = LogFactory.getLog(PropertyEditor.class);
	private final TVI tvi;

	public PropertyEditor(TVI tvi) {
		this.tvi = tvi;
	}

	-at-Override
	public void setAsText(String text) throws IllegalArgumentException {
		
		log.info("Searching for Property with ID: " + text);

		if (text.equals("null")) {
			setValue(null);
			return;
		}

		Property prop = this.tvi.loadProperty(Integer.parseInt(text));
		
		if (prop.getId() != null) {
			log.info("Found matching Property with ID: " + text);
			setValue(prop);
		}
		else
			log.warn("Unable to find matching Property with ID: " + text);
		
	}

	-at-Override 
	public String getAsText() {
		
		Property property = (Property)getValue();
		
		if (property == null) {
			log.info("Returning text id for Property as EMPTY");
			return "";
		}
		
		log.info("Returning text id for Property: " + property.getId().toString());
		
		return property.getId().toString();
		
	}
	
}

Finally... the view:

<form:form modelAttribute="inventory">
  <table>
		<tr>
      <th>
        TV: <form:errors path="tv" cssClass="errors"/>
        <br/>
        <form:select path="tv" items="${tvs}" itemValue="id" itemLabel="makeModel" />
      </th>
    </tr>
		<tr>
      <th>
        Property: <form:errors path="properties" cssClass="errors"/>
        <br/>
        <form:select path="properties" >
        	<!-- <form:option value="null" label="- NONE -" /> -->
        	<form:options items="${properties}" itemValue="id" itemLabel="name"/>
        </form:select>
      </th>
    </tr>
    <tr>
      <th>
        Serial #: <form:errors path="serial" cssClass="errors"/>
        <br/>
        <form:input path="serial" size="30" maxlength="80"/>
      </th>
    </tr>
    <tr>
      <td>
        <c:choose>
          <c:when test="${inventory.new}">
            <p class="submit"><input type="submit" value="Add Inventory"/></p>
          </c:when>
          <c:otherwise>
            <p class="submit"><input type="submit" value="Update Inventory"/></p>
          </c:otherwise>
        </c:choose>
      </td>
    </tr>
  </table>
</form:form>

When I log the count of properties selected in my submit function on the controller it's always 0 regardless of what is selected when I'm adding a new item so I'm thinking there is a binding disconnect somewhere.

Thanks for any help you can give this Spring newbie... However, I must admit that I really like what I have seen so far in the MVC world of java development.

Sincerely,

Lindsey

[Lindsey]

I got it working but would like someone to confirm this is the right implementation, it's not much extra code, but I dont want to be rewriting something spring can achieve by convention.

Just added this to the top of the controller to parse the HttpRequest header:

		String[] propertyIds = request.getParameterValues("properties");
		
		inventory.clearProperties(); // if editing, clear them so it deletes if you chose to unassign any or all.
		
		if (propertyIds != null)
			for (int i = 0; i < propertyIds.length; i++)
				inventory.addProperty(this.tvi.loadProperty(new Integer(propertyIds[i]).intValue()));
		
		... validation / submission ...