This version is still in development and is not considered stable yet. For the latest stable version, please use Spring Boot 3.3.4! |
This version is still in development and is not considered stable yet. For the latest stable version, please use Spring Boot 3.3.4! |
This section describes how to develop a small “Hello World!” web application that highlights some of Spring Boot’s key features. You can choose between Maven or Gradle as the build system.
The spring.io website contains many “Getting Started” guides that use Spring Boot. If you need to solve a specific problem, check there first. You can shortcut the steps below by going to start.spring.io and choosing the "Web" starter from the dependencies searcher. Doing so generates a new project structure so that you can start coding right away. Check the start.spring.io user guide for more details. |
The spring.io website contains many “Getting Started” guides that use Spring Boot. If you need to solve a specific problem, check there first. You can shortcut the steps below by going to start.spring.io and choosing the "Web" starter from the dependencies searcher. Doing so generates a new project structure so that you can start coding right away. Check the start.spring.io user guide for more details. |
Prerequisites
Before we begin, open a terminal and run the following commands to ensure that you have a valid version of Java installed:
$ java -version
openjdk version "17.0.4.1" 2022-08-12 LTS
OpenJDK Runtime Environment (build 17.0.4.1+1-LTS)
OpenJDK 64-Bit Server VM (build 17.0.4.1+1-LTS, mixed mode, sharing)
This sample needs to be created in its own directory. Subsequent instructions assume that you have created a suitable directory and that it is your current directory. |
Maven
If you want to use Maven, ensure that you have Maven installed:
$ mvn -v
Apache Maven 3.8.5 (3599d3414f046de2324203b78ddcf9b5e4388aa0)
Maven home: usr/Users/developer/tools/maven/3.8.5
Java version: 17.0.4.1, vendor: BellSoft, runtime: /Users/developer/sdkman/candidates/java/17.0.4.1-librca
Gradle
If you want to use Gradle, ensure that you have Gradle installed:
$ gradle --version
------------------------------------------------------------
Gradle 8.1.1
------------------------------------------------------------
Build time: 2023-04-21 12:31:26 UTC
Revision: 1cf537a851c635c364a4214885f8b9798051175b
Kotlin: 1.8.10
Groovy: 3.0.15
Ant: Apache Ant(TM) version 1.10.11 compiled on July 10 2021
JVM: 17.0.7 (BellSoft 17.0.7+7-LTS)
OS: Linux 6.2.12-200.fc37.aarch64 aarch64
This sample needs to be created in its own directory. Subsequent instructions assume that you have created a suitable directory and that it is your current directory. |
Setting Up the Project With Maven
We need to start by creating a Maven pom.xml
file.
The pom.xml
is the recipe that is used to build your project.
Open your favorite text editor and add the following:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<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 https://maven.apache.org/xsd/maven-4.0.0.xsd">
<modelVersion>4.0.0</modelVersion>
<groupId>com.example</groupId>
<artifactId>myproject</artifactId>
<version>0.0.1-SNAPSHOT</version>
<parent>
<groupId>org.springframework.boot</groupId>
<artifactId>spring-boot-starter-parent</artifactId>
<version>3.4.0-SNAPSHOT</version>
</parent>
<!-- Additional lines to be added here... -->
<!-- (you don't need this if you are using a release version) -->
<repositories>
<repository>
<id>spring-snapshots</id>
<url>https://repo.spring.io/snapshot</url>
<snapshots><enabled>true</enabled></snapshots>
</repository>
<repository>
<id>spring-milestones</id>
<url>https://repo.spring.io/milestone</url>
</repository>
</repositories>
<pluginRepositories>
<pluginRepository>
<id>spring-snapshots</id>
<url>https://repo.spring.io/snapshot</url>
</pluginRepository>
<pluginRepository>
<id>spring-milestones</id>
<url>https://repo.spring.io/milestone</url>
</pluginRepository>
</pluginRepositories>
</project>
The preceding listing should give you a working build.
You can test it by running mvn package
(for now, you can ignore the “jar will be empty - no content was marked for inclusion!” warning).
At this point, you could import the project into an IDE (most modern Java IDEs include built-in support for Maven). For simplicity, we continue to use a plain text editor for this example. |
At this point, you could import the project into an IDE (most modern Java IDEs include built-in support for Maven). For simplicity, we continue to use a plain text editor for this example. |
Setting Up the Project With Gradle
We need to start by creating a Gradle build.gradle
file.
The build.gradle
is the build script that is used to build your project.
Open your favorite text editor and add the following:
plugins {
id 'java'
id 'org.springframework.boot' version '3.4.0-SNAPSHOT'
}
apply plugin: 'io.spring.dependency-management'
group = 'com.example'
version = '0.0.1-SNAPSHOT'
sourceCompatibility = '17'
repositories {
mavenCentral()
maven { url 'https://repo.spring.io/milestone' }
maven { url 'https://repo.spring.io/snapshot' }
}
dependencies {
}
The preceding listing should give you a working build.
You can test it by running gradle classes
.
At this point, you could import the project into an IDE (most modern Java IDEs include built-in support for Gradle). For simplicity, we continue to use a plain text editor for this example. |
At this point, you could import the project into an IDE (most modern Java IDEs include built-in support for Gradle). For simplicity, we continue to use a plain text editor for this example. |
Adding Classpath Dependencies
Spring Boot provides a number of starters that let you add jars to your classpath. Starters provide dependencies that you are likely to need when developing a specific type of application.
Maven
Most Spring Boot applications use the spring-boot-starter-parent
in the parent
section of the POM.
The spring-boot-starter-parent
is a special starter that provides useful Maven defaults.
It also provides a dependency-management
section so that you can omit version
tags for “blessed” dependencies.
Since we are developing a web application, we add a spring-boot-starter-web
dependency.
Before that, we can look at what we currently have by running the following command:
$ mvn dependency:tree
[INFO] com.example:myproject:jar:0.0.1-SNAPSHOT
The mvn dependency:tree
command prints a tree representation of your project dependencies.
You can see that spring-boot-starter-parent
provides no dependencies by itself.
To add the necessary dependencies, edit your pom.xml
and add the spring-boot-starter-web
dependency immediately below the parent
section:
<dependencies>
<dependency>
<groupId>org.springframework.boot</groupId>
<artifactId>spring-boot-starter-web</artifactId>
</dependency>
</dependencies>
If you run mvn dependency:tree
again, you see that there are now a number of additional dependencies, including the Tomcat web server and Spring Boot itself.
Gradle
Most Spring Boot applications use the org.springframework.boot
Gradle plugin.
This plugin provides useful defaults and Gradle tasks.
The io.spring.dependency-management
Gradle plugin provides dependency management so that you can omit version
tags for “blessed” dependencies.
Since we are developing a web application, we add a spring-boot-starter-web
dependency.
Before that, we can look at what we currently have by running the following command:
$ gradle dependencies
> Task :dependencies
------------------------------------------------------------
Root project 'myproject'
------------------------------------------------------------
The gradle dependencies
command prints a tree representation of your project dependencies.
Right now, the project has no dependencies.
To add the necessary dependencies, edit your build.gradle
and add the spring-boot-starter-web
dependency in the dependencies
section:
dependencies {
implementation 'org.springframework.boot:spring-boot-starter-web'
}
If you run gradle dependencies
again, you see that there are now a number of additional dependencies, including the Tomcat web server and Spring Boot itself.
Writing the Code
To finish our application, we need to create a single Java file.
By default, Maven and Gradle compile sources from src/main/java
, so you need to create that directory structure and then add a file named src/main/java/MyApplication.java
to contain the following code:
-
Java
-
Kotlin
import org.springframework.boot.SpringApplication;
import org.springframework.boot.autoconfigure.SpringBootApplication;
import org.springframework.web.bind.annotation.RequestMapping;
import org.springframework.web.bind.annotation.RestController;
@RestController
@SpringBootApplication
public class MyApplication {
@RequestMapping("/")
String home() {
return "Hello World!";
}
public static void main(String[] args) {
SpringApplication.run(MyApplication.class, args);
}
}
import org.springframework.boot.autoconfigure.SpringBootApplication
import org.springframework.boot.runApplication
import org.springframework.web.bind.annotation.RequestMapping
import org.springframework.web.bind.annotation.RestController
@RestController
@SpringBootApplication
class MyApplication {
@RequestMapping("/")
fun home() = "Hello World!"
}
fun main(args: Array<String>) {
runApplication<MyApplication>(*args)
}
Although there is not much code here, quite a lot is going on. We step through the important parts in the next few sections.
The @RestController and @RequestMapping Annotations
The first annotation on our MyApplication
class is @RestController
.
This is known as a stereotype annotation.
It provides hints for people reading the code and for Spring that the class plays a specific role.
In this case, our class is a web @Controller
, so Spring considers it when handling incoming web requests.
The @RequestMapping
annotation provides “routing” information.
It tells Spring that any HTTP request with the /
path should be mapped to the home
method.
The @RestController
annotation tells Spring to render the resulting string directly back to the caller.
The @RestController and @RequestMapping annotations are Spring MVC annotations (they are not specific to Spring Boot).
See the MVC section in the Spring Reference Documentation for more details.
|
The @SpringBootApplication Annotation
The second class-level annotation is @SpringBootApplication
.
This annotation is known as a meta-annotation, it combines @SpringBootConfiguration
, @EnableAutoConfiguration
and @ComponentScan
.
Of those, the annotation we’re most interested in here is @EnableAutoConfiguration
.
@EnableAutoConfiguration
tells Spring Boot to “guess” how you want to configure Spring, based on the jar dependencies that you have added.
Since spring-boot-starter-web
added Tomcat and Spring MVC, the auto-configuration assumes that you are developing a web application and sets up Spring accordingly.
The “main” Method
The final part of our application is the main
method.
This is a standard method that follows the Java convention for an application entry point.
Our main method delegates to Spring Boot’s SpringApplication
class by calling run
.
SpringApplication
bootstraps our application, starting Spring, which, in turn, starts the auto-configured Tomcat web server.
We need to pass MyApplication.class
as an argument to the run
method to tell SpringApplication
which is the primary Spring component.
The args
array is also passed through to expose any command-line arguments.
The @RestController and @RequestMapping annotations are Spring MVC annotations (they are not specific to Spring Boot).
See the MVC section in the Spring Reference Documentation for more details.
|
Running the Example
Maven
At this point, your application should work.
Since you used the spring-boot-starter-parent
POM, you have a useful run
goal that you can use to start the application.
Type mvn spring-boot:run
from the root project directory to start the application.
You should see output similar to the following:
$ mvn spring-boot:run
. ____ _ __ _ _
/\\ / ___'_ __ _ _(_)_ __ __ _ \ \ \ \
( ( )\___ | '_ | '_| | '_ \/ _` | \ \ \ \
\\/ ___)| |_)| | | | | || (_| | ) ) ) )
' |____| .__|_| |_|_| |_\__, | / / / /
=========|_|==============|___/=/_/_/_/
:: Spring Boot :: (v3.4.0-SNAPSHOT)
....... . . .
....... . . . (log output here)
....... . . .
........ Started MyApplication in 0.906 seconds (process running for 6.514)
If you open a web browser to localhost:8080
, you should see the following output:
Hello World!
To gracefully exit the application, press ctrl-c
.
Gradle
At this point, your application should work.
Since you used the org.springframework.boot
Gradle plugin, you have a useful bootRun
goal that you can use to start the application.
Type gradle bootRun
from the root project directory to start the application.
You should see output similar to the following:
$ gradle bootRun
. ____ _ __ _ _
/\\ / ___'_ __ _ _(_)_ __ __ _ \ \ \ \
( ( )\___ | '_ | '_| | '_ \/ _` | \ \ \ \
\\/ ___)| |_)| | | | | || (_| | ) ) ) )
' |____| .__|_| |_|_| |_\__, | / / / /
=========|_|==============|___/=/_/_/_/
:: Spring Boot :: (v3.4.0-SNAPSHOT)
....... . . .
....... . . . (log output here)
....... . . .
........ Started MyApplication in 0.906 seconds (process running for 6.514)
If you open a web browser to localhost:8080
, you should see the following output:
Hello World!
To gracefully exit the application, press ctrl-c
.
Creating an Executable Jar
We finish our example by creating a completely self-contained executable jar file that we could run in production. Executable jars (sometimes called “uber jars” or “fat jars”) are archives containing your compiled classes along with all of the jar dependencies that your code needs to run.
Maven
To create an executable jar, we need to add the spring-boot-maven-plugin
to our pom.xml
.
To do so, insert the following lines just below the dependencies
section:
<build>
<plugins>
<plugin>
<groupId>org.springframework.boot</groupId>
<artifactId>spring-boot-maven-plugin</artifactId>
</plugin>
</plugins>
</build>
The spring-boot-starter-parent POM includes <executions> configuration to bind the repackage goal.
If you do not use the parent POM, you need to declare this configuration yourself.
See the plugin documentation for details.
|
Save your pom.xml
and run mvn package
from the command line, as follows:
$ mvn package
[INFO] Scanning for projects...
[INFO]
[INFO] ------------------------------------------------------------------------
[INFO] Building myproject 0.0.1-SNAPSHOT
[INFO] ------------------------------------------------------------------------
[INFO] .... ..
[INFO] --- maven-jar-plugin:2.4:jar (default-jar) @ myproject ---
[INFO] Building jar: /Users/developer/example/spring-boot-example/target/myproject-0.0.1-SNAPSHOT.jar
[INFO]
[INFO] --- spring-boot-maven-plugin:3.4.0-SNAPSHOT:repackage (default) @ myproject ---
[INFO] ------------------------------------------------------------------------
[INFO] BUILD SUCCESS
[INFO] ------------------------------------------------------------------------
If you look in the target
directory, you should see myproject-0.0.1-SNAPSHOT.jar
.
The file should be around 18 MB in size.
If you want to peek inside, you can use jar tvf
, as follows:
$ jar tvf target/myproject-0.0.1-SNAPSHOT.jar
You should also see a much smaller file named myproject-0.0.1-SNAPSHOT.jar.original
in the target
directory.
This is the original jar file that Maven created before it was repackaged by Spring Boot.
To run that application, use the java -jar
command, as follows:
$ java -jar target/myproject-0.0.1-SNAPSHOT.jar
. ____ _ __ _ _
/\\ / ___'_ __ _ _(_)_ __ __ _ \ \ \ \
( ( )\___ | '_ | '_| | '_ \/ _` | \ \ \ \
\\/ ___)| |_)| | | | | || (_| | ) ) ) )
' |____| .__|_| |_|_| |_\__, | / / / /
=========|_|==============|___/=/_/_/_/
:: Spring Boot :: (v3.4.0-SNAPSHOT)
....... . . .
....... . . . (log output here)
....... . . .
........ Started MyApplication in 0.999 seconds (process running for 1.253)
As before, to exit the application, press ctrl-c
.
Gradle
To create an executable jar, we need to run gradle bootJar
from the command line, as follows:
$ gradle bootJar
BUILD SUCCESSFUL in 639ms
3 actionable tasks: 3 executed
If you look in the build/libs
directory, you should see myproject-0.0.1-SNAPSHOT.jar
.
The file should be around 18 MB in size.
If you want to peek inside, you can use jar tvf
, as follows:
$ jar tvf build/libs/myproject-0.0.1-SNAPSHOT.jar
To run that application, use the java -jar
command, as follows:
$ java -jar build/libs/myproject-0.0.1-SNAPSHOT.jar
. ____ _ __ _ _
/\\ / ___'_ __ _ _(_)_ __ __ _ \ \ \ \
( ( )\___ | '_ | '_| | '_ \/ _` | \ \ \ \
\\/ ___)| |_)| | | | | || (_| | ) ) ) )
' |____| .__|_| |_|_| |_\__, | / / / /
=========|_|==============|___/=/_/_/_/
:: Spring Boot :: (v{version-spring-boot})
....... . . .
....... . . . (log output here)
....... . . .
........ Started MyApplication in 0.999 seconds (process running for 1.253)
As before, to exit the application, press ctrl-c
.
The spring-boot-starter-parent POM includes <executions> configuration to bind the repackage goal.
If you do not use the parent POM, you need to declare this configuration yourself.
See the plugin documentation for details.
|