Using Hidden Form Field for Session Management in Servlet

Hidden form field can also be used to store session information for a particular client. In case of hidden form field a hidden field is used to store client state. In this case user information is stored in hidden field value and retrieved from another servlet.

Advantages of Using Hidden Form Field for Session Management

• Does not have to depend on browser whether the cookie is disabled or not.
• Inserting a simple HTML Input field of type hidden is required. Hence, its easier to implement.

Disadvantage of Using Hidden Form Field for Session Management

• Extra form submission is required on every page. This is a big overhead.

Example demonstrating usage of Hidden Form Field for Session

Below mentioned files are required for the example:

index.html

<form method="post" action="validate">
  Name:<input type="text" name="user" /><br/>
  Password:<input type="text" name="pass" ><br/>
  <input type="submit" value="submit">
</form>

web.xml

<web-app...>
    
    <servlet>
        <servlet-name>First</servlet-name>
        <servlet-class>First</servlet-class>
    </servlet> 
    <servlet-mapping>
        <servlet-name>First</servlet-name>
        <url-pattern>/First</url-pattern>
    </servlet-mapping>
    
    <servlet>
        <servlet-name>Second</servlet-name>
        <servlet-class>Second</servlet-class>
    </servlet>
    <servlet-mapping>
        <servlet-name>Second</servlet-name>
        <url-pattern>/Second</url-pattern>
    </servlet-mapping>
    
    <welcome-file-list>
        <welcome-file>index.html</welcome-file>
    </welcome-file-list>
    
</web-app>

First.java

import java.io.*;
import javax.servlet.*;
import javax.servlet.http.*;

public class First extends HttpServlet {

  protected void doPost(HttpServletRequest request, HttpServletResponse response)
            throws ServletException, IOException {
        response.setContentType("text/html;charset=UTF-8");
        PrintWriter out = response.getWriter();
        
	//getting value submitted in form from HTML file
        String user = request.getParameter("user");
        
        //creating a new hidden form field
        out.println("<form action='Second'>");
        out.println("<input type='hidden' name='user' value='"+user+"'>");
        out.println("<input type='submit' value='submit' >");
        out.println("</form>");
    }
}

Second.java

import java.io.*;
import javax.servlet.*;
import javax.servlet.http.*;

public class Second extends HttpServlet {

  protected void doGet(HttpServletRequest request, HttpServletResponse response)
            throws ServletException, IOException {
        response.setContentType("text/html;charset=UTF-8");
        PrintWriter out = response.getWriter();
        
        //getting parameter from the hidden field
        String user = request.getParameter("user");
        out.println("Welcome "+user);
    }
}

Like we created a hidden field in First Servlet, populated the value of user, and sent it to the Second Servlet, now Second servlet also has the user information. Similarly we will have to keep sending this information, wherever we need this, using hidden fields.

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