Custom Validator for Java

The Custom Validator for Java is a Java class/Servlet filter designed to submit a HTML interfaces of dynamic web applications to online validation services.

Usage

To use this class, you will need a Java Servlet container that supports the Servlet API version 2.3 or greater.

drop validator.jar in your web apps lib directory
copy the contents of one of the sample web.xml files into your web app's WEB-INF/web.xml file

...and you are ready to go. This will result in the current page being submitted to the W3C validation service and the results displayed in a new window. To configure the output and other parameters of the validator filter, configure the class by modifying or adding init-param elements to the filer element in the web.xml file (see example below). Configuration options include:

method signature	default value	description
validatorUrl	http://validator.w3.org/check? uri=###URL###"	the URL of the validator to submit this page to; place the string '###URL###' where the URL of the resource to be validated should go (as in the default)
fileExtension	.validate.html	this is extension added to the script name when the HTTP request is written to disk
buttonText	validate	this is the text which appears in the validate button
buttonMarker	[places marker at end of HTML <body> element]	this asks the validator to substitute a string in the target page with the validation link, allowing you to avoid a sure-fire validation error (the validator drops the link at the end of the file by default) as well as customize the display
targetWindow	newWindow	the name of the window to direct validation results to; you may use the typical constants, '_blank', '_top', etc.
windowOptions	scrollbars=yes,location=yes, menubar=yes,titlebar=yes, resizable=yes,width=600, height=450	these are the options to use IF opening a browser window to display the results
workDir	[directory where JSP script was run]	the directory where static files should be written to disk
workDirUrl	[web path to directory where JSP script was run]	the web server URL for the workDir; used to show the validation service where to access the static HTML files

A fuller configuration might look like:

<filter>
<filter-name>ValidatorFilter</filter-name>
<filter-class>org.twine.filter.ValidatorFilter</filter-class>
<init-param>
<param-name>validatorUrl</param-name>
<param-value>http://validator.w3.org/check?uri=###URL###</param-value>
</init-param>
<init-param>
<param-name>buttonText</param-name>
<param-value>[validate]</param-value>
</init-param>
<init-param>
<param-name>buttonMarker</param-name>
<param-value>###BUTTON###</param-value>
</init-param>
<init-param>
<param-name>fileExtension</param-name>
<param-value>.validate.html</param-value>
</init-param>
<init-param>
<param-name>targetWindow</param-name>
<param-value>someWindow</param-value>
</init-param>
<init-param>
<param-name>windowOptions</param-name>
<param-value>scrollbars=yes,location=yes,menubar=yes,titlebar=yes,resizable=yes,width=600,height=500</param-value>
</init-param>
</filter>

<filter-mapping>
<filter-name>ValidatorFilter</filter-name>
<url-pattern>/*.jsp</url-pattern>
</filter-mapping>
<filter-mapping>
<filter-name>ValidatorFilter</filter-name>
<url-pattern>/*.do</url-pattern>
</filter-mapping>

This asks the Validator class to...

set the validation service URL to 'http://validator.w3.org/check?uri=' (an accessibility validator)
set the button text to '[validate]'
substitute the text '###BUTTON###' in the source file with the validaton button
use the file extension '.validate.html' wen writing the request results to disk
direct the output to the window 'someWindow'
use the parameters 'scrollbars=yes,location=yes' when opening the window
finally, a filter-mapping of /* instructs the filter to intercept all web application requests for requests ending in '.jsp' or '.do'