tiles.xml: Definitions and Inheritance

Base Definition

<tiles-definitions>
  <definition name="base" template="/WEB-INF/views/layout.jsp">
    <put-attribute name="title" value="GroovyGrails Tiles Demo"/>
    <put-attribute name="header" value="/WEB-INF/views/header.jsp"/>
    <put-attribute name="menu" value="/WEB-INF/views/menu.jsp"/>
    <put-attribute name="body" value=""/>
    <put-attribute name="footer" value="/WEB-INF/views/footer.jsp"/>
  </definition>

  <definition name="home" extends="base">
    <put-attribute name="title" value="Book Catalog"/>
    <put-attribute name="body" value="/WEB-INF/views/home.jsp"/>
  </definition>
</tiles-definitions>

Inheritance Wins

home extends base and overrides only title and body. Twenty pages share one layout; each page is two lines of XML.

put-attribute Flavours

• value - a JSP path or literal string.
• expression - OGNL/EL evaluated at render.
• cascaded - pass attributes down nested definitions.

Key Points

• One base definition, many thin children.
• Controller returns the definition name, never a JSP path.
• Keep tiles.xml under WEB-INF so URLs cannot fetch it directly.