I have heard Spring for years but i have no chance to work with it before. Finally i could get a touch on it in year 2010. My first goal is learning the Spring MVC.

I find a very useful tutorial on building a Spring MVC application. The sample codes there use Ant for building the application.

• Developing a Spring Framework MVC application step-by-step

I have followed Chapter 1 – Basic Application and Environment Setup and and created the same sample project but with Maven without using Ant.
 

*Note: I try to use Spring 3.0 in the following example

Basic Application and Environment Setup

---

1. Follow Maven – Create a Simple Webapp Project to create a simple webapp Maven project

2. Edit the pom.xml as follow

<project xmlns="http://maven.apache.org/POM/4.0.0" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance" xsi:schemaLocation="http://maven.apache.org/POM/4.0.0 http://maven.apache.org/maven-v4_0_0.xsd">
	<modelVersion>4.0.0</modelVersion>
	<groupId>spring-mvc-trial</groupId>
	<artifactId>spring-mvc-trial</artifactId>
	<packaging>war</packaging>
	<version>1.0</version>
	<name>Spring MVC Trial</name>
	<description>Spring MVC Trial</description>

	<!-- Repositories -->
	<repositories>
		<!-- EBR Spring Release Repository -->
		<repository>
			<id>com.springsource.repository.bundles.release</id>
			<name>EBR Spring Release Repository</name>
			<url>http://repository.springsource.com/maven/bundles/release</url>
		</repository>
		<!-- EBR Spring External Repository -->
		<repository>
			<id>com.springsource.repository.bundles.external</id>
			<name>EBR External Release Repository</name>
			<url>http://repository.springsource.com/maven/bundles/external</url>
		</repository>
		<!-- EBR Spring Milestone Repository -->
		<!--repository>
			<id>com.springsource.repository.bundles.milestone</id>
			<name>EBR Spring Milestone Repository</name>
			<url>http://repository.springsource.com/maven/bundles/milestone</url>
		</repository-->
		<!-- EBR Spring Snapshot Repository -->
		<!--repository>
			<id>com.springsource.repository.bundles.snapshot</id>
			<name>EBR Spring Snapshot Repository</name>
			<url>http://repository.springsource.com/maven/bundles/snapshot</url>
		</repository-->
		<!-- Maven Central Compatible Spring Snapshot Repository -->
		<!--repository>
			<id>org.springframework.maven.snapshot</id>
			<name>Maven Central Compatible Spring Snapshot Repository</name>
			<url>http://maven.springframework.org/snapshot</url>
		</repository-->
	</repositories>
	
	<!-- Project properties -->
	<properties>
		<org.springframework.version>3.0.1.RELEASE</org.springframework.version>
	</properties>
	
	<!-- Build Configuration -->
	<build>
		<plugins>
			<plugin>
				<artifactId>maven-compiler-plugin</artifactId>
				<version>2.1</version>
				<configuration>
					<source>1.5</source>
					<target>1.5</target>
				</configuration>
			</plugin>
		</plugins>
	</build>
	
	<!-- Dependencies -->
	<dependencies>
		<!-- Spring framework -->
		<dependency>
			<groupId>org.springframework</groupId>
			<artifactId>org.springframework.core</artifactId>
			<version>${org.springframework.version}</version>
		</dependency>
		<dependency>
			<groupId>org.springframework</groupId>
			<artifactId>org.springframework.web</artifactId>
			<version>${org.springframework.version}</version>
		</dependency>
		<dependency>
			<groupId>org.springframework</groupId>
			<artifactId>org.springframework.web.servlet</artifactId>
			<version>${org.springframework.version}</version>
		</dependency>
		
		<!-- Other dependencies -->
		<dependency>
			<groupId>commons-logging</groupId>
			<artifactId>commons-logging</artifactId>
			<version>1.1.1</version>
		</dependency>
		<dependency>
			<groupId>javax.servlet</groupId>
			<artifactId>servlet-api</artifactId>
			<version>2.5</version>
		</dependency>
		<dependency>
			<groupId>junit</groupId>
			<artifactId>junit</artifactId>
			<version>4.8.1</version>
		</dependency>
	</dependencies>
	
</project>

 

3. Add the servlet mapping to the web.xml

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>

<web-app
	version="2.4"
	xmlns="http://java.sun.com/xml/ns/j2ee"
	xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
	xsi:schemaLocation="http://java.sun.com/xml/ns/j2ee http://java.sun.com/xml/ns/j2ee/web-app_2_4.xsd"
>

	<!-- springapp servlet -->
	<servlet>
		<servlet-name>springapp</servlet-name>
		<servlet-class>org.springframework.web.servlet.DispatcherServlet</servlet-class>
		<load-on-startup>1</load-on-startup>
	</servlet>
	<servlet-mapping>
		<servlet-name>springapp</servlet-name>
		<url-pattern>*.htm</url-pattern>
	</servlet-mapping>

	<!-- Welcome files -->
	<welcome-file-list>
		<welcome-file>index.jsp</welcome-file>
	</welcome-file-list>
</web-app>

 

4. Also create the springapp-servlet.xml in the WEB-INF folder

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>

<beans
	xmlns="http://www.springframework.org/schema/beans"
	xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
	xsi:schemaLocation="http://www.springframework.org/schema/beans
	http://www.springframework.org/schema/beans/spring-beans-2.5.xsd">

	<!-- the application context definition for the springapp DispatcherServlet -->
	<bean name="/hello.htm" class="springapp.web.HelloController"/>
</beans>

 

5. Create the /src/main/java/springapp/web/HelloController.java

package springapp.web;

import org.springframework.web.servlet.mvc.Controller;
import org.springframework.web.servlet.ModelAndView;
import javax.servlet.ServletException;
import javax.servlet.http.HttpServletRequest;
import javax.servlet.http.HttpServletResponse;
import org.apache.commons.logging.Log;
import org.apache.commons.logging.LogFactory;

import java.io.IOException;

public class HelloController implements Controller {

	protected final Log logger = LogFactory.getLog(getClass());

	public ModelAndView handleRequest(HttpServletRequest request, HttpServletResponse response) throws ServletException, IOException {
		logger.info("Returning hello view");
		System.out.println("stdout - Returning hello view");

		return new ModelAndView("hello.jsp");
	}
}

 

6. Create the /src/test/java/springapp/web/HelloControllerTest.java for unit Test

package springapp.web;

import org.springframework.web.servlet.ModelAndView;
import springapp.web.HelloController;
import junit.framework.TestCase;

public class HelloControllerTest extends TestCase {

	public void testHandleRequestView() throws Exception{		
		HelloController controller = new HelloController();
		ModelAndView modelAndView = controller.handleRequest(null, null);		
		assertEquals("hello.jsp", modelAndView.getViewName());
	}
}

 

7. Create the /src/main/webapp/hello.jsp

<head><title>Hello :: Spring Application</title></head>
<body>
	<h1>Hello - Spring Application</h1>
	<p>Greetings.</p>
</body>

 

8. The folder structure should look like this

 

9. Run Maven install to build the .war file

[INFO] Scanning for projects...
[INFO] ------------------------------------------------------------------------
[INFO] Building Spring MVC Trial
[INFO] 
[INFO] Id: spring-mvc-trial:spring-mvc-trial:war:1.0
[INFO] task-segment: [install]
[INFO] ------------------------------------------------------------------------
[INFO] [resources:resources]
[INFO] Using default encoding to copy filtered resources.
[INFO] [compiler:compile]
[INFO] Nothing to compile - all classes are up to date
[INFO] [resources:testResources]
[INFO] Using default encoding to copy filtered resources.
[INFO] [compiler:testCompile]
[INFO] Nothing to compile - all classes are up to date
[INFO] [surefire:test]
[INFO] Surefire report directory: D:\Workspaces\spring3-trial\spring-mvc-trial\target\surefire-reports

-------------------------------------------------------
 T E S T S
-------------------------------------------------------
Running springapp.web.HelloControllerTest
2010/2/28 下午 11:53:35 springapp.web.HelloController handleRequest
資訊: Returning hello view
stdout - Returning hello view
Tests run: 1, Failures: 0, Errors: 0, Skipped: 0, Time elapsed: 0.11 sec

Results :

Tests run: 1, Failures: 0, Errors: 0, Skipped: 0

[INFO] [war:war]
[INFO] Packaging webapp
[INFO] Assembling webapp[spring-mvc-trial] in [D:\Workspaces\spring3-trial\spring-mvc-trial\target\spring-mvc-trial-1.0]
[INFO] Processing war project
[INFO] Webapp assembled in[86 msecs]
[INFO] Building war: D:\Workspaces\spring3-trial\spring-mvc-trial\target\spring-mvc-trial-1.0.war
[INFO] [install:install]
[INFO] Installing D:\Workspaces\spring3-trial\spring-mvc-trial\target\spring-mvc-trial-1.0.war to C:\Users\Administrator\.m2\repository\spring-mvc-trial\spring-mvc-trial\1.0\spring-mvc-trial-1.0.war
[INFO] ------------------------------------------------------------------------
[INFO] BUILD SUCCESSFUL
[INFO] ------------------------------------------------------------------------
[INFO] Total time: 4 seconds
[INFO] Finished at: Sun Feb 28 23:53:36 CST 2010
[INFO] Final Memory: 2M/12M
[INFO] ------------------------------------------------------------------------

 

10. Copy the .war file to the Tomcat webapp folder
 

11. Open the hello.htm in browser

 

12. Check the Tomcat stdout_<yyyymmdd>.log and you should find the log written by the HelloController

Done =)

Update 2010-03-31:
Add the spring framework repositories in the pom.xml. Thanks Daniele.

Update 2010-12-27:
Uncommented the EBR Spring External Repository in the pom.xml to solve the missing com.springsource.org.aopalliance-1.0.0.jar problem.

Update 2010-12-31:
It is found that the default Maven Repository also contains the springframwork libraries. So you don’t need to specify the EBR repositories in the pom.xml, just rename the dependencies as follow.

...
<!-- Spring framework -->
<dependency>
	<groupId>org.springframework</groupId>
	<artifactId>spring-core</artifactId>
	<version>${org.springframework.version}</version>
</dependency>
<dependency>
  <groupId>org.springframework</groupId>
  <artifactId>spring-web</artifactId>
  <version>${org.springframework.version}</version>
</dependency>
<dependency>
  <groupId>org.springframework</groupId>
  <artifactId>spring-webmvc</artifactId>
  <version>${org.springframework.version}</version>
</dependency>
...

 

Thanks Alex. =)