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Creating the Application's Output

 So far, you have a way for the guest to enter information and a way for the application to store that information. Now, the application needs to do something with the information.

For now, you'll have the application simply display the same information the user entered, in a slightly different format. This allows you to verify that you have correctly received the data. To do this, you'll add dynamic string elements (WOStrings) to the main page and bind them. In the next chapter, you'll use more complex forms of output.

  1. In WebObjects Builder, place the cursor at the end of the document, making sure that it is outside the gray rectangle that represents the form, and press Enter.

  2. Choose from the Elements pop-up list to display the Structures buttons.

  3. Click to create a horizontal line (an <HR> element).

  4. Press Enter to add a blank line.

  5. Select from the Elements pop-up list to display the Other WebObjects buttons.

  6. Add a WOString element by clicking .

    A WOString is a dynamic element whose value is determined at run time. It is shown as a small rectangle surrounded by two icons.

  7. In the object browser, click the guestName variable and drag the cursor to the center rectangle of the WOString.

    Notice that the name guestName appears inside the WOString, and the Inspector window doesn't come to the front. The message "Connected guestName to value" appears in the upper-right corner of the window.

    WebObjects provides this shortcut for binding to the value attribute of WOStrings, because it is the attribute you most often want to bind. The value attribute signifies the string that will be displayed when the page is drawn. If you want to bind a different attribute, you drag-connect to the left or right icon, and the Inspector appears as usual.

  8. Click to the right of the WOString and press Enter.

  9. Create two more WOStrings and bind them to email and comments, respectively.

    Note that it isn't necessary to resize the WOStrings as you did with the text fields. They expand at run time to display the value of the variables to which they are bound.

  10. Save your component. It should now look like this:
In summary, when the user clicks the Submit button, a new request-response cycle begins. WebObjects stores the data entered in the dynamic form elements in the variables they are bound to (guestName contains the value in the Name field, email contains the value in the E-mail field, and comments contains the value in the Comments field). It then triggers the action method bound to the action attribute of the WOSubmitButton. The action method returns a page (which, in this example, is the same page). When the page is redrawn, the dynamic strings at the bottom show the values entered by the user.

Now you are ready to test your application.

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