Module jakarta.el
Package jakarta.el

Class Expression

  • All Implemented Interfaces:
    Serializable
    Direct Known Subclasses:
    MethodExpression, ValueExpression
    public abstract class Expression
extends Object
implements Serializable
    Base class for the expression subclasses ValueExpression and MethodExpression, implementing characteristics common to both.

    All expressions must implement the equals() and hashCode() methods so that two expressions can be compared for equality. They are redefined abstract in this class to force their implementation in subclasses.

    All expressions must also be Serializable so that they can be saved and restored.

    Expressions are also designed to be immutable so that only one instance needs to be created for any given expression String / FunctionMapper. This allows a container to pre-create expressions and not have to re-parse them each time they are evaluated.

    Since:
    Jakarta Server Pages 2.1
    See Also:
    Serialized Form

    • Constructor Detail

      • Expression

        public Expression()

    • Method Detail

      • getExpressionString

        public abstract String getExpressionString()
        Returns the original String used to create this Expression, unmodified.

        This is used for debugging purposes but also for the purposes of comparison (e.g. to ensure the expression in a configuration file has not changed).

        This method does not provide sufficient information to re-create an expression. Two different expressions can have exactly the same expression string but different function mappings. Serialization should be used to save and restore the state of an Expression.

        Returns:
        The original expression String.

      • equals

        public abstract boolean equals​(Object obj)
        Determines whether the specified object is equal to this Expression.

        The result is true if and only if the argument is not null, is an Expression object that is the of the same type (ValueExpression or MethodExpression), and has an identical parsed representation.

        Note that two expressions can be equal if their expression Strings are different. For example, ${fn1:foo()} and ${fn2:foo()} are equal if their corresponding FunctionMappers mapped fn1:foo and fn2:foo to the same method.

        Overrides:
        equals in class Object
        Parameters:
        obj - the Object to test for equality.
        Returns:
        true if obj equals this Expression; false otherwise.
        See Also:
        Hashtable, Object.equals(java.lang.Object)

      • hashCode

        public abstract int hashCode()
        Returns the hash code for this Expression.

        See the note in the equals(java.lang.Object) method on how two expressions can be equal if their expression Strings are different. Recall that if two objects are equal according to the equals(Object) method, then calling the hashCode method on each of the two objects must produce the same integer result. Implementations must take special note and implement hashCode correctly.

        Overrides:
        hashCode in class Object
        Returns:
        The hash code for this Expression.
        See Also:
        equals(java.lang.Object), Hashtable, Object.hashCode()

      • isLiteralText

        public abstract boolean isLiteralText()
        Returns whether this expression was created from only literal text.

        This method must return true if and only if the expression string this expression was created from contained no unescaped Jakarta Expression Language delimeters (${...} or #{...}).

        Returns:
        true if this expression was created from only literal text; false otherwise.