How do I access files in /WEB-INF using HTML in a Tomcat server?

Question

Currently I have a website running which allows the user to enter a password into a . The form calls a doPost() to a Java HttpServlet file, which then checks if the field entered was correct or not.

Depending on the condition, it either redirect to TryAgain or Menu page using the following

request.getRequestDispatcher("/WEB-INF/FOLDERNAME/Menu.jsp").forward(
                request, response);

This part works okay, but once I am on the Menu page I have two hyperlinks which should redirect to either /WEB-INF/FOLDERNAME/Multi.jsp or /WEB-INF/FOLDERNAME/Single.jsp

I need to keep these pages only accessible by users who signed in successfully on the initial password form page, so I put these inside of my /WEB-INF/ folder.

The problem I am having is how do I redirect to the appropriate page (Multi.jsp/Single.jsp) using HTML? I think it is a bit of an overkill to wire these two hyperlinks to two individual forms and call the request.getRequestDispatcher().forward(); from doPost(){} just to redirect a user.

Is there a different way to go about doing this?

Answer 1

I figured out a method, and would like to share it with others.

On my Menu.jsp I created a with two href attributes

<nav>
  <ul>
    <li><a href="../FOLDER/menu-servlet?roster">Upload Roster File</a></li>
    <li><a href="../FOLDER/menu-servlet?manual">Manual Order</a></li>
  </ul>
</nav>

This called my HttpServlet doGet() method. Inside of here, I was able to grab the query string, which is the text following in the url.

Then I did a simple if comparison in my doGet() method.

 String queryString =request.getQueryString();
       // PrintWriter out = response.getWriter();
       // out.println(request.getQueryString());  

        //check where to redirect
        if (queryString.equals("roster")) {
            //redirect to Roster Upload jsp
            request.getRequestDispatcher("/WEB-INF/FOLDER/Roster.jsp").forward(request, response);
        } else if (queryString.equals("manual")) {
            //redirect to Manual Generation jsp
            request.getRequestDispatcher("/WEB-INF/FOLDER/ManualOrder.jsp").forward(
                request, response);
        }