Includes a file of text or code in the JSP source file.
<%@ include file="relativeURL" %>
include.jsp: <html> <head><title>An Include Test</title></head> <body bgcolor="white"> <font color="blue"> The current date and time are <%@ include file="date.jsp" %> </font> </body> </html>date.jsp: <%@ page import="java.util.*" %> <%= (new java.util.Date() ).toLocaleString() %> Displays in the page: The current date and time are Aug 30, 1999 2:38:40
The include directive inserts a file of text or code in a JSP file at translation time, when the JSP file is compiled. The include process is static. A static include means that the text of the included file is added to the JSP file. The included file can be a JSP file, HTML file, or text file. If the included file is a JSP file, its JSP tags are parsed and their results included (along with any other text) in the JSP file.
You can only use include to include static files. This means that the parsed result of the included file is added to the JSP file where the include directive is placed. Once the included file is parsed and included, processing resumes with the next line of the calling JSP file.
The included file can be an HTML file, a JSP file, a text file, or a code file written in the Java programming language. Be careful, though, that the included file does not contain <html>, </html>, <body>, or </body> tags. Because the entire content of the included file is added at that location in the JSP file, these tags would conflict with similar tags in the JSP file.
Some of the behaviors of the include directive depend on the JSP engine, for example:
file="relativeURL"
The pathname to the included file, which can contain any text or code that is valid in a JSP file. The value of file is always a relative URL. Simply put, a relative URL is just the path segment of an URL, without the protocol, port, or domain:
"error.jsp""/templates/onlinestore.html""/beans/calendar.jsp"
If the relative URL starts with /, the path is relative to the JSP application's context, which is a javax.servlet.ServletContext object that is in turn stored in the application object. If the relative URL starts with a directory or file name, the path is relative to the JSP file.