title: javax.faces.el.PropertyNotFoundException - Base is null: item
body: <p>I'm getting this "Base is null: item" jsf1.1 error in datatable that I just couldn't quite figure out.  It is a two level datatable and the error is happening on the 2nd level datatable.  The first level datatable is bind to the value of ArrayList deviceListDeviceReferences.  In this datatable, it has a column that contains another datatable.  This 2nd level datatable is bind to the value of ArrayList holderNameMasks.  This value it retrived from DeviceReferenceJTO, which is basically the row item from the first datatable.  </p>
  
  <p>Below is what a snippet of the html:</p>
  
  <pre><code>&lt;h:dataTable border="0" cellspacing="0"
      value="#{deviceReferenceBean.deviceListDeviceReferences" var="item"  
      rendered="#{not empty deviceReferenceBean.deviceListDeviceReferences }"  
      binding="#{deviceReferenceBean.deviceListDeviceReferencesTable}"
  &gt;
      &lt;h:column&gt;
          &lt;h:outputText value="Holder Name:" /&gt;
          &lt;!--  device heading --&gt;
          &lt;h:outputText value="#{item.deviceLabel }" styleClass="DeviceReferenceTitleBarBorder" style="width:100%; height:30px; background-color:#f9f9f9"/&gt;
          &lt;!-- holder name --&gt;   
          &lt;h:panelGrid columns="2" rendered="#{item.hasHolderNameMasks}" &gt;
              &lt;h:outputText value="Holder Name:" /&gt;
              &lt;h:dataTable border="0" cellspacing="0" 
                  value="#{item.holderNameMasks}" var="holderMaskItem"  
                  rendered="#{not empty deviceReferenceBean.deviceListDeviceReferences and item.hasHolderNameMasks}"  
                  binding="#{item.holderNameMasksTable}"
              &gt;
                  &lt;h:column&gt;
                      &lt;h:outputText value="#{holderMaskItem.fieldLabel}" /&gt;
                  &lt;/h:column&gt;
                  &lt;h:column&gt;
                      &lt;h:panelGrid columns="1"&gt;
                          &lt;h:inputText value="#{holderMaskItem.fieldValue}" /&gt;
                          &lt;h:outputText value="#{holderMaskItem.instruction }" rendered="#{holderMaskItem.hasInstruction"/&gt;
                      &lt;/h:panelGrid&gt;
                  &lt;/h:column&gt;
              &lt;/h:dataTable&gt;
          &lt;/h:panelGrid&gt;  
      &lt;/h:column&gt;
  &lt;/h:dataTable&gt;
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>Below is what the component looks like:</p>
  
  <pre><code>&lt;HtmlForm enctype="application/x-www-form-urlencoded" id="_idJsp323" rendered="true" styleClass="MAForm" submitted="false" transient="false"&gt;
  
      &lt;HtmlDataTable border="0" cellspacing="0" first="0" id="_idJsp324" rendered="#{not empty deviceReferenceBean.deviceListDeviceReferences }=true" rowIndex="-1" rows="0" transient="false" var="item" binding="#{deviceReferenceBean.deviceListDeviceReferencesTable}"&gt;
  
          &lt;UIColumn id="_idJsp325" rendered="true" transient="false"&gt;
  
              &lt;HtmlOutputText escape="true" id="_idJsp326" rendered="true" style="width:100%; height:30px; background-color:#f9f9f9" styleClass="DeviceReferenceTitleBarBorder" transient="false"/&gt;
  
              &lt;HtmlPanelGrid border="-2147483648" columns="2" id="_idJsp327" rendered="#{item.hasHolderNameMasks}=true" transient="false"&gt;
  
                  &lt;HtmlOutputText escape="true" id="_idJsp328" rendered="true" transient="false" value="Holder Name:"/&gt;
  
              &lt;/HtmlPanelGrid&gt;
  
          &lt;/UIColumn&gt;
  
      &lt;/HtmlDataTable&gt;
  
  &lt;/HtmlForm&gt;
  </code></pre>