Member Avatar for moonis.ahmed

Hi,

I want to get only the filename from the entire path in a file dialog in JSP. Right now I am using type "file" in input tag.

any help will be appreciated.

cheers!

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  • Latest Post Latest Post by kvprajapati

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Generated

Modern browsers intentionally prevent access to the full client file path for privacy/security; most code should rely on the filename only (some browsers return a fake path like C:\fakepath\). already pointed out both client- and server-side options — here are up-to-date, practical ways to get just the filename and caveats to keep in mind.

The most reliable client-side approach is the HTML5 File API (useful when the filename is needed before upload):

<input type="file" id="fileInput">

<script>
const fileInput = document.getElementById('fileInput');
fileInput.addEventListener('change', () => {
  const f = fileInput.files && fileInput.files[0];
  if (f) {
    console.log(f.name); // filename only
  } else {
    // fallback for very old browsers
    const nameFallback = fileInput.value.replace(/^.*[\\\/]/, '');
    console.log(nameFallback);
  }
});
</script>

Server-side (when the upload reaches the server) is the authoritative place to decide what to store. With Servlet 3+ use Part.getSubmittedFileName() and strip any path elements safely:

Part p = request.getPart("fileField");
String raw = p.getSubmittedFileName();
String filename = java.nio.file.Paths.get(raw).getFileName().toString();

For older stacks using Commons FileUpload, FileItem.getName() may return a client path on some UAs; pass that value through org.apache.commons.io.FilenameUtils.getName(...) to get the base name.

Important cautions: never trust client-supplied filenames for storage — sanitize/remove dangerous characters, limit length, enforce type/size checks, and use server-generated unique names or directories to avoid collisions and path traversal. For reference on the File API and input:file behavior see the MDN docs: input type="file" and File.name.

Member Avatar for kvprajapati

There is not jsp dialog user interface for file selection. It's a input type file html tag.
If you want to get filename only in your server side (java) code then use,

File s=new File("c:\\aa\\b.txt");
System.out.println(s.getName());

Use following javascript code to get filename.

....
<script type="text/javascript">
   function doit() {
    var v=form1.file.value; 
    alert(v.substring(v.lastIndexOf("\\")+1));
   }
</script>
 ....
<form method="post" name="form1">
<input type="file" name="file"/>
  <input type="button" value="Test" onclick="doit()"/>
</form>
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