What is wrong with headerKey=“-1”?
What is wrong with: <s:select list="fruits" name="fruitSelect" id="fruitSelect" listKey="fid" listValue="fname" headerKey="-1" headerValue="Pick a fruit!" /> Plenty of online examples use this value: http://www.coderanch.com/t/439139/Struts/wrong-select http://www.mkyong.com/struts2/struts-2-sselect-drop-down-box-example/ BUT the actual documentation (you can view this on the tooltip in Eclipse by hovering over the symbol) says Key for first item in list. Must not be empty! '-1' and '' is correct, '' is bad. -1 seems pretty logical to me and it shouldn't be a valid option anyway. " is correct,