option selected = problem

Question

Hi,
I have following code in my Jsp.
                         <tr>
               <td><B><I>FaultCode:</I></B></td>
               <td>
               <select name = "faultCoode" >
               <% for ( int t = 0; t < h.size(); t++){ %>
               <% System.out.println("Here it came as "+faultCode); %>
               <option Selected = "<%=faultCode%>" value = "<%=(((Vector)h.get(Integer.toString(t)))).get(3)%>" ><%=(((Vector)h.get(Integer.toString(t)))).get(3) %>
               <% } %>
               </select>
               </td>
               </tr>
          </tr>
The problem is even if
System.out.println("Here it came as "+faultCode); prints faultCode as 161 But "Selected" will always selects 199 in the options dropdown. Why is that? Selected should have selected 161 in that case. OR For that matter whatever the faultCode value is printed it should always apper in the dropdown. What is happening here? any idea?
Interestingly 199 is the faultCode appears in the last Vector that is stored in the Hashtable instance h. What modification should I do in my code??
thanks,
pp

Answer 1

You don't use selected in an option like that. Selected is just an attribute that marks that value as selected, so you only want 1 option in the list selected. You can use multiple selected options for multi-select lists, of course. But in a single-select list, it'll pick the last one that is "selected". Selected doesn't take a value, generally, it's just a flag... What you want is this:
<select name="faultCode">
<%
for( int t = 0; t < h.size(); t++){
   Object value = (((Vector)h.get(Integer.toString(t)))).get(3);
%>
<option <%= faultCode.equals(value) ? "selected" : ""%> value="<%= value %>"><%= value %></option>
<% } %>
</select>which results in this, if faultCode is "ccc"..:
<select name="faultCode">
<option value="aaa">aaa</option>
<option selected value="bbb">bbb</option>
<option value="ccc">ccc</option>
<option value="ddd">ddd</option>
</select>