JSP + JDBC + MySql Problem (Tomcat 4.1)

Question

I'm completely helpless... whenever I try to retrieve stuff from the db (using a jsp page), I get errors that don't even make sense.
out.println(stmt.executeQuery("SELECT * FROM newsTbl WHERE articleID = 1").getString("articleTitle"));if I try doing the above, I get a "ServletException : Before start of result set" error that supposedly occurred at this line of the generated servlet:
if (pageContext != null) pageContext.handlePageException(t);---------------
If i try this:
ResultSet rsSec = stmt.executeQuery("SELECT * FROM newsSecTbl");
rsSec.beforeFirst();  //<-- Even if I don't have this line the result does not change
  out.println(rsSec.next());
  while (rsSec.next()) { ... }I the while loop is never initiated, because rsSec.next() is false... kind of weird if you ask me, I even put two entries into the table to make sure the cursor wasnt at the first record and saying there was no second one (which would have been right if there were only one record).
I would be very grateful if someone could help me out with this. I've never done any db programming with Java yet, so I dont have a clue what Im doing. By the way, I'm using MySql (indicated in the title) and the server was running and available when I ran the above code.
Cheers,
Tom

Answer 1

You can't do this:
out.println(stmt.executeQuery("SELECT * FROM newsTbl WHERE articleID = 1").getString("articleTitle"));The ResultSet you get back is a database cursor that doesn't point to the first row yet. The correct idiom is:
String sql = "SELECT * FROM newsTbl WHERE articleID = 1";
ResultSet result = stmt.executeQuery(sql);
String articleTitle = "";
while (result.next())
   title = result.getString("articleTitle");
result.close();
stmt.close();If you've never done DB programming before, I'd recommend that you click on the Tutorials link to the left and go through the JDBC tutorial carefully. You'll save yourself a lot of grief.
Another good idea would be to separate out all your database code into at least one separate object, independent of the servlet. That way you can test and develop it off to the side until it's 100% solid. Then your servlet can simply instantiate one and use it. All your problems from that point forward will be servlet issues, because you'll know that your database code is working. - MOD
See if that works better. - MOD