Expression Language (EL) was introduced in JSP 2.0 to simplify access to data stored in JavaBeans, request parameters, session attributes, and other objects. EL expressions use the syntax ${expression} and can be used directly in HTML without scriptlets.
EL makes JSP pages cleaner and easier to maintain by eliminating verbose Java code like <%= (String) session.getAttribute("user") %> and replacing it with ${sessionScope.user}.
| EL Object | Type | Description |
|---|---|---|
param | Map<String,String> | Request parameters (single value) |
paramValues | Map<String,String[]> | Request parameters (multiple values) |
header | Map<String,String> | HTTP request headers |
headerValues | Map<String,String[]> | HTTP headers (multiple values) |
cookie | Map<String,Cookie> | Cookies from the request |
pageScope | Map | Page-scoped attributes |
requestScope | Map | Request-scoped attributes |
sessionScope | Map | Session-scoped attributes |
applicationScope | Map | Application-scoped attributes |
initParam | Map | Context init parameters from web.xml |
pageContext | PageContext | Access to JSP page context |
<%@ page language="java" contentType="text/html; charset=UTF-8"%>
<%
// Set attributes in different scopes
request.setAttribute("message", "Hello from Request!");
session.setAttribute("username", "Alice");
session.setAttribute("age", 25);
application.setAttribute("appVersion", "2.0");
%>
<html><body>
<h3>Accessing Scoped Attributes</h3>
<p>Request: ${requestScope.message}</p>
<p>Session username: ${sessionScope.username}</p>
<p>Session age: ${sessionScope.age}</p>
<p>App version: ${applicationScope.appVersion}</p>
<%-- EL searches all scopes automatically (page, request, session, app) --%>
<p>Auto-search: ${username}</p>
<h3>Request Parameters</h3>
<p>Name param: ${param.name}</p>
<p>Age param: ${param.age}</p>
<h3>Headers and Cookies</h3>
<p>User-Agent: ${header['User-Agent']}</p>
<p>Cookie value: ${cookie.JSESSIONID.value}</p>
<h3>pageContext</h3>
<p>Context path: ${pageContext.request.contextPath}</p>
<p>Server name: ${pageContext.request.serverName}</p>
</body></html>EL supports arithmetic, relational, logical, and the empty operator:
<%@ page language="java" contentType="text/html; charset=UTF-8"%>
<html><body>
<h3>Arithmetic Operators</h3>
<p>10 + 5 = ${10 + 5}</p>
<p>10 - 3 = ${10 - 3}</p>
<p>4 * 3 = ${4 * 3}</p>
<p>10 / 3 = ${10 / 3}</p>
<p>10 mod 3 = ${10 mod 3}</p>
<h3>Relational Operators</h3>
<p>5 == 5: ${5 == 5}</p>
<p>5 != 3: ${5 != 3}</p>
<p>10 > 5: ${10 gt 5}</p>
<p>3 < 7: ${3 lt 7}</p>
<p>5 >= 5: ${5 ge 5}</p>
<h3>Logical Operators</h3>
<p>true && false: ${true and false}</p>
<p>true || false: ${true or false}</p>
<p>!true: ${not true}</p>
<h3>Empty Operator</h3>
<p>Is null empty: ${empty null}</p>
<p>Is "" empty: ${empty ""}</p>
<p>Is "hello" empty: ${empty "hello"}</p>
<h3>Ternary / Conditional</h3>
<p>${param.age gt 18 ? "Adult" : "Minor"}</p>
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