7. The IoC container

It can be useful to have bean definitions span multiple XML files. Often each individual XML configuration file represents a logical layer or module in your architecture.

You can use the application context constructor to load bean definitions from all these XML fragments. This constructor takes multiple Resource locations, as was shown in the previous section. Alternatively, use one or more occurrences of the <import/> element to load bean definitions from another file or files. For example:

<beans>
    <import resource="services.xml"/>
    <import resource="resources/messageSource.xml"/>
    <import resource="/resources/themeSource.xml"/>

    <bean id="bean1" class="..."/>
    <bean id="bean2" class="..."/>
</beans>

In the preceding example, external bean definitions are loaded from three files: services.xml, messageSource.xml, and themeSource.xml. All location paths are relative to the definition file doing the importing, so services.xml must be in the same directory or classpath location as the file doing the importing, while messageSource.xml and themeSource.xml must be in a resources location below the location of the importing file. As you can see, a leading slash is ignored, but given that these paths are relative, it is better form not to use the slash at all. The contents of the files being imported, including the top level <beans/> element, must be valid XML bean definitions according to the Spring Schema.

Note

It is possible, but not recommended, to reference files in parent directories using a relative "../" path. Doing so creates a dependency on a file that is outside the current application. In particular, this reference is not recommended for "classpath:" URLs (for example, "classpath:../services.xml"), where the runtime resolution process chooses the "nearest" classpath root and then looks into its parent directory. Classpath configuration changes may lead to the choice of a different, incorrect directory. You can always use fully qualified resource locations instead of relative paths: for example, "file:C:/config/services.xml" or "classpath:/config/services.xml". However, be aware that you are coupling your application’s configuration to specific absolute locations. It is generally preferable to keep an indirection for such absolute locations, for example, through "${…}" placeholders that are resolved against JVM system properties at runtime.

The import directive is a feature provided by the beans namespace itself. Further configuration features beyond plain bean definitions are available in a selection of XML namespaces provided by Spring, e.g. the "context" and the "util" namespace.

As a further example for externalized configuration metadata, bean definitions can also be expressed in Spring’s Groovy Bean Definition DSL, as known from the Grails framework. Typically, such configuration will live in a ".groovy" file with a structure as follows:

beans {
    dataSource(BasicDataSource) {
        driverClassName = "org.hsqldb.jdbcDriver"
        url = "jdbc:hsqldb:mem:grailsDB"
        username = "sa"
        password = ""
        settings = [mynew:"setting"]
    }
    sessionFactory(SessionFactory) {
        dataSource = dataSource
    }
    myService(MyService) {
        nestedBean = { AnotherBean bean ->
            dataSource = dataSource
        }
    }
}

This configuration style is largely equivalent to XML bean definitions and even supports Spring’s XML configuration namespaces. It also allows for importing XML bean definition files through an "importBeans" directive.

In a bean definition itself, you can supply more than one name for the bean, by using a combination of up to one name specified by the id attribute, and any number of other names in the name attribute. These names can be equivalent aliases to the same bean, and are useful for some situations, such as allowing each component in an application to refer to a common dependency by using a bean name that is specific to that component itself.

Specifying all aliases where the bean is actually defined is not always adequate, however. It is sometimes desirable to introduce an alias for a bean that is defined elsewhere. This is commonly the case in large systems where configuration is split amongst each subsystem, each subsystem having its own set of object definitions. In XML-based configuration metadata, you can use the <alias/> element to accomplish this.

<alias name="fromName" alias="toName"/>

In this case, a bean (in the same container) named fromName may also, after the use of this alias definition, be referred to as toName.

For example, the configuration metadata for subsystem A may refer to a DataSource by the name of subsystemA-dataSource. The configuration metadata for subsystem B may refer to a DataSource by the name of subsystemB-dataSource. When composing the main application that uses both these subsystems, the main application refers to the DataSource by the name of myApp-dataSource. To have all three names refer to the same object, you can add the following alias definitions to the configuration metadata:

<alias name="myApp-dataSource" alias="subsystemA-dataSource"/>
<alias name="myApp-dataSource" alias="subsystemB-dataSource"/>

Now each component and the main application can refer to the dataSource through a name that is unique and guaranteed not to clash with any other definition (effectively creating a namespace), yet they refer to the same bean.

When you create a bean by the constructor approach, all normal classes are usable by and compatible with Spring. That is, the class being developed does not need to implement any specific interfaces or to be coded in a specific fashion. Simply specifying the bean class should suffice. However, depending on what type of IoC you use for that specific bean, you may need a default (empty) constructor.

The Spring IoC container can manage virtually any class you want it to manage; it is not limited to managing true JavaBeans. Most Spring users prefer actual JavaBeans with only a default (no-argument) constructor and appropriate setters and getters modeled after the properties in the container. You can also have more exotic non-bean-style classes in your container. If, for example, you need to use a legacy connection pool that absolutely does not adhere to the JavaBean specification, Spring can manage it as well.

With XML-based configuration metadata you can specify your bean class as follows:

<bean id="exampleBean" class="examples.ExampleBean"/>

<bean name="anotherExample" class="examples.ExampleBeanTwo"/>

For details about the mechanism for supplying arguments to the constructor (if required) and setting object instance properties after the object is constructed, see Injecting Dependencies.

When defining a bean that you create with a static factory method, you use the class attribute to specify the class containing the static factory method and an attribute named factory-method to specify the name of the factory method itself. You should be able to call this method (with optional arguments as described later) and return a live object, which subsequently is treated as if it had been created through a constructor. One use for such a bean definition is to call static factories in legacy code.

The following bean definition specifies that the bean will be created by calling a factory-method. The definition does not specify the type (class) of the returned object, only the class containing the factory method. In this example, the createInstance() method must be a static method.

<bean id="clientService"
    class="examples.ClientService"
    factory-method="createInstance"/>

public class ClientService {
    private static ClientService clientService = new ClientService();
    private ClientService() {}

    public static ClientService createInstance() {
        return clientService;
    }
}

For details about the mechanism for supplying (optional) arguments to the factory method and setting object instance properties after the object is returned from the factory, see Dependencies and configuration in detail.

Similar to instantiation through a static factory method, instantiation with an instance factory method invokes a non-static method of an existing bean from the container to create a new bean. To use this mechanism, leave the class attribute empty, and in the factory-bean attribute, specify the name of a bean in the current (or parent/ancestor) container that contains the instance method that is to be invoked to create the object. Set the name of the factory method itself with the factory-method attribute.

<!-- the factory bean, which contains a method called createInstance() -->
<bean id="serviceLocator" class="examples.DefaultServiceLocator">
    <!-- inject any dependencies required by this locator bean -->
</bean>

<!-- the bean to be created via the factory bean -->
<bean id="clientService"
    factory-bean="serviceLocator"
    factory-method="createClientServiceInstance"/>

public class DefaultServiceLocator {

    private static ClientService clientService = new ClientServiceImpl();

    public ClientService createClientServiceInstance() {
        return clientService;
    }
}

One factory class can also hold more than one factory method as shown here:

<bean id="serviceLocator" class="examples.DefaultServiceLocator">
    <!-- inject any dependencies required by this locator bean -->
</bean>

<bean id="clientService"
    factory-bean="serviceLocator"
    factory-method="createClientServiceInstance"/>

<bean id="accountService"
    factory-bean="serviceLocator"
    factory-method="createAccountServiceInstance"/>

public class DefaultServiceLocator {

    private static ClientService clientService = new ClientServiceImpl();

    private static AccountService accountService = new AccountServiceImpl();

    public ClientService createClientServiceInstance() {
        return clientService;
    }

    public AccountService createAccountServiceInstance() {
        return accountService;
    }
}

This approach shows that the factory bean itself can be managed and configured through dependency injection (DI). See Dependencies and configuration in detail.

	Note
	In Spring documentation, factory bean refers to a bean that is configured in the Spring container that will create objects through an instance or static factory method. By contrast, FactoryBean (notice the capitalization) refers to a Spring-specific FactoryBean.

Constructor-based DI is accomplished by the container invoking a constructor with a number of arguments, each representing a dependency. Calling a static factory method with specific arguments to construct the bean is nearly equivalent, and this discussion treats arguments to a constructor and to a static factory method similarly. The following example shows a class that can only be dependency-injected with constructor injection. Notice that there is nothing special about this class, it is a POJO that has no dependencies on container specific interfaces, base classes or annotations.

public class SimpleMovieLister {

    // the SimpleMovieLister has a dependency on a MovieFinder
    private MovieFinder movieFinder;

    // a constructor so that the Spring container can inject a MovieFinder
    public SimpleMovieLister(MovieFinder movieFinder) {
        this.movieFinder = movieFinder;
    }

    // business logic that actually uses the injected MovieFinder is omitted...
}

package x.y;

public class Foo {

    public Foo(Bar bar, Baz baz) {
        // ...
    }
}

<beans>
    <bean id="foo" class="x.y.Foo">
        <constructor-arg ref="bar"/>
        <constructor-arg ref="baz"/>
    </bean>

    <bean id="bar" class="x.y.Bar"/>

    <bean id="baz" class="x.y.Baz"/>
</beans>

package examples;

public class ExampleBean {

    // Number of years to calculate the Ultimate Answer
    private int years;

    // The Answer to Life, the Universe, and Everything
    private String ultimateAnswer;

    public ExampleBean(int years, String ultimateAnswer) {
        this.years = years;
        this.ultimateAnswer = ultimateAnswer;
    }
}

<bean id="exampleBean" class="examples.ExampleBean">
    <constructor-arg type="int" value="7500000"/>
    <constructor-arg type="java.lang.String" value="42"/>
</bean>

<bean id="exampleBean" class="examples.ExampleBean">
    <constructor-arg index="0" value="7500000"/>
    <constructor-arg index="1" value="42"/>
</bean>

<bean id="exampleBean" class="examples.ExampleBean">
    <constructor-arg name="years" value="7500000"/>
    <constructor-arg name="ultimateAnswer" value="42"/>
</bean>

package examples;

public class ExampleBean {

    // Fields omitted

    @ConstructorProperties({"years", "ultimateAnswer"})
    public ExampleBean(int years, String ultimateAnswer) {
        this.years = years;
        this.ultimateAnswer = ultimateAnswer;
    }
}

Setter-based DI is accomplished by the container calling setter methods on your beans after invoking a no-argument constructor or no-argument static factory method to instantiate your bean.

The following example shows a class that can only be dependency-injected using pure setter injection. This class is conventional Java. It is a POJO that has no dependencies on container specific interfaces, base classes or annotations.

public class SimpleMovieLister {

    // the SimpleMovieLister has a dependency on the MovieFinder
    private MovieFinder movieFinder;

    // a setter method so that the Spring container can inject a MovieFinder
    public void setMovieFinder(MovieFinder movieFinder) {
        this.movieFinder = movieFinder;
    }

    // business logic that actually uses the injected MovieFinder is omitted...
}

The ApplicationContext supports constructor-based and setter-based DI for the beans it manages. It also supports setter-based DI after some dependencies have already been injected through the constructor approach. You configure the dependencies in the form of a BeanDefinition, which you use in conjunction with PropertyEditor instances to convert properties from one format to another. However, most Spring users do not work with these classes directly (i.e., programmatically) but rather with XML bean definitions, annotated components (i.e., classes annotated with @Component, @Controller, etc.), or @Bean methods in Java-based @Configuration classes. These sources are then converted internally into instances of BeanDefinition and used to load an entire Spring IoC container instance.

The container performs bean dependency resolution as follows:

The Spring container validates the configuration of each bean as the container is created. However, the bean properties themselves are not set until the bean is actually created. Beans that are singleton-scoped and set to be pre-instantiated (the default) are created when the container is created. Scopes are defined in Section 7.5, “Bean scopes”. Otherwise, the bean is created only when it is requested. Creation of a bean potentially causes a graph of beans to be created, as the bean’s dependencies and its dependencies' dependencies (and so on) are created and assigned. Note that resolution mismatches among those dependencies may show up late, i.e. on first creation of the affected bean.

You can generally trust Spring to do the right thing. It detects configuration problems, such as references to non-existent beans and circular dependencies, at container load-time. Spring sets properties and resolves dependencies as late as possible, when the bean is actually created. This means that a Spring container which has loaded correctly can later generate an exception when you request an object if there is a problem creating that object or one of its dependencies. For example, the bean throws an exception as a result of a missing or invalid property. This potentially delayed visibility of some configuration issues is why ApplicationContext implementations by default pre-instantiate singleton beans. At the cost of some upfront time and memory to create these beans before they are actually needed, you discover configuration issues when the ApplicationContext is created, not later. You can still override this default behavior so that singleton beans will lazy-initialize, rather than be pre-instantiated.

If no circular dependencies exist, when one or more collaborating beans are being injected into a dependent bean, each collaborating bean is totally configured prior to being injected into the dependent bean. This means that if bean A has a dependency on bean B, the Spring IoC container completely configures bean B prior to invoking the setter method on bean A. In other words, the bean is instantiated (if not a pre-instantiated singleton), its dependencies are set, and the relevant lifecycle methods (such as a configured init method or the InitializingBean callback method) are invoked.

The following example uses XML-based configuration metadata for setter-based DI. A small part of a Spring XML configuration file specifies some bean definitions:

<bean id="exampleBean" class="examples.ExampleBean">
    <!-- setter injection using the nested ref element -->
    <property name="beanOne">
        <ref bean="anotherExampleBean"/>
    </property>

    <!-- setter injection using the neater ref attribute -->
    <property name="beanTwo" ref="yetAnotherBean"/>
    <property name="integerProperty" value="1"/>
</bean>

<bean id="anotherExampleBean" class="examples.AnotherBean"/>
<bean id="yetAnotherBean" class="examples.YetAnotherBean"/>

public class ExampleBean {

    private AnotherBean beanOne;

    private YetAnotherBean beanTwo;

    private int i;

    public void setBeanOne(AnotherBean beanOne) {
        this.beanOne = beanOne;
    }

    public void setBeanTwo(YetAnotherBean beanTwo) {
        this.beanTwo = beanTwo;
    }

    public void setIntegerProperty(int i) {
        this.i = i;
    }
}

In the preceding example, setters are declared to match against the properties specified in the XML file. The following example uses constructor-based DI:

<bean id="exampleBean" class="examples.ExampleBean">
    <!-- constructor injection using the nested ref element -->
    <constructor-arg>
        <ref bean="anotherExampleBean"/>
    </constructor-arg>

    <!-- constructor injection using the neater ref attribute -->
    <constructor-arg ref="yetAnotherBean"/>

    <constructor-arg type="int" value="1"/>
</bean>

<bean id="anotherExampleBean" class="examples.AnotherBean"/>
<bean id="yetAnotherBean" class="examples.YetAnotherBean"/>

public class ExampleBean {

    private AnotherBean beanOne;

    private YetAnotherBean beanTwo;

    private int i;

    public ExampleBean(
        AnotherBean anotherBean, YetAnotherBean yetAnotherBean, int i) {
        this.beanOne = anotherBean;
        this.beanTwo = yetAnotherBean;
        this.i = i;
    }
}

The constructor arguments specified in the bean definition will be used as arguments to the constructor of the ExampleBean.

Now consider a variant of this example, where instead of using a constructor, Spring is told to call a static factory method to return an instance of the object:

<bean id="exampleBean" class="examples.ExampleBean" factory-method="createInstance">
    <constructor-arg ref="anotherExampleBean"/>
    <constructor-arg ref="yetAnotherBean"/>
    <constructor-arg value="1"/>
</bean>

<bean id="anotherExampleBean" class="examples.AnotherBean"/>
<bean id="yetAnotherBean" class="examples.YetAnotherBean"/>

public class ExampleBean {

    // a private constructor
    private ExampleBean(...) {
        ...
    }

    // a static factory method; the arguments to this method can be
    // considered the dependencies of the bean that is returned,
    // regardless of how those arguments are actually used.
    public static ExampleBean createInstance (
        AnotherBean anotherBean, YetAnotherBean yetAnotherBean, int i) {

        ExampleBean eb = new ExampleBean (...);
        // some other operations...
        return eb;
    }
}

Arguments to the static factory method are supplied via <constructor-arg/> elements, exactly the same as if a constructor had actually been used. The type of the class being returned by the factory method does not have to be of the same type as the class that contains the static factory method, although in this example it is. An instance (non-static) factory method would be used in an essentially identical fashion (aside from the use of the factory-bean attribute instead of the class attribute), so details will not be discussed here.

The value attribute of the <property/> element specifies a property or constructor argument as a human-readable string representation. Spring’s conversion service is used to convert these values from a String to the actual type of the property or argument.

<bean id="myDataSource" class="org.apache.commons.dbcp.BasicDataSource" destroy-method="close">
    <!-- results in a setDriverClassName(String) call -->
    <property name="driverClassName" value="com.mysql.jdbc.Driver"/>
    <property name="url" value="jdbc:mysql://localhost:3306/mydb"/>
    <property name="username" value="root"/>
    <property name="password" value="masterkaoli"/>
</bean>

The following example uses the p-namespace for even more succinct XML configuration.

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

    <bean id="myDataSource" class="org.apache.commons.dbcp.BasicDataSource"
        destroy-method="close"
        p:driverClassName="com.mysql.jdbc.Driver"
        p:url="jdbc:mysql://localhost:3306/mydb"
        p:username="root"
        p:password="masterkaoli"/>

</beans>

The preceding XML is more succinct; however, typos are discovered at runtime rather than design time, unless you use an IDE such as IntelliJ IDEA or the Spring Tool Suite (STS) that support automatic property completion when you create bean definitions. Such IDE assistance is highly recommended.

You can also configure a java.util.Properties instance as:

<bean id="mappings"
    class="org.springframework.beans.factory.config.PropertyPlaceholderConfigurer">

    <!-- typed as a java.util.Properties -->
    <property name="properties">
        <value>
            jdbc.driver.className=com.mysql.jdbc.Driver
            jdbc.url=jdbc:mysql://localhost:3306/mydb
        </value>
    </property>
</bean>

The Spring container converts the text inside the <value/> element into a java.util.Properties instance by using the JavaBeans PropertyEditor mechanism. This is a nice shortcut, and is one of a few places where the Spring team do favor the use of the nested <value/> element over the value attribute style.

The idref element

The idref element is simply an error-proof way to pass the id (string value - not a reference) of another bean in the container to a <constructor-arg/> or <property/> element.

<bean id="theTargetBean" class="..."/>

<bean id="theClientBean" class="...">
    <property name="targetName">
        <idref bean="theTargetBean"/>
    </property>
</bean>

The above bean definition snippet is exactly equivalent (at runtime) to the following snippet:

<bean id="theTargetBean" class="..." />

<bean id="client" class="...">
    <property name="targetName" value="theTargetBean"/>
</bean>

The first form is preferable to the second, because using the idref tag allows the container to validate at deployment time that the referenced, named bean actually exists. In the second variation, no validation is performed on the value that is passed to the targetName property of the client bean. Typos are only discovered (with most likely fatal results) when the client bean is actually instantiated. If the client bean is a prototype bean, this typo and the resulting exception may only be discovered long after the container is deployed.

	Note
	The local attribute on the idref element is no longer supported in the 4.0 beans xsd since it does not provide value over a regular bean reference anymore. Simply change your existing idref local references to idref bean when upgrading to the 4.0 schema.

A common place (at least in versions earlier than Spring 2.0) where the <idref/> element brings value is in the configuration of AOP interceptors in a ProxyFactoryBean bean definition. Using <idref/> elements when you specify the interceptor names prevents you from misspelling an interceptor id.

The ref element is the final element inside a <constructor-arg/> or <property/> definition element. Here you set the value of the specified property of a bean to be a reference to another bean (a collaborator) managed by the container. The referenced bean is a dependency of the bean whose property will be set, and it is initialized on demand as needed before the property is set. (If the collaborator is a singleton bean, it may be initialized already by the container.) All references are ultimately a reference to another object. Scoping and validation depend on whether you specify the id/name of the other object through the bean, local, or parent attributes.

Specifying the target bean through the bean attribute of the <ref/> tag is the most general form, and allows creation of a reference to any bean in the same container or parent container, regardless of whether it is in the same XML file. The value of the bean attribute may be the same as the id attribute of the target bean, or as one of the values in the name attribute of the target bean.

<ref bean="someBean"/>

Specifying the target bean through the parent attribute creates a reference to a bean that is in a parent container of the current container. The value of the parent attribute may be the same as either the id attribute of the target bean, or one of the values in the name attribute of the target bean, and the target bean must be in a parent container of the current one. You use this bean reference variant mainly when you have a hierarchy of containers and you want to wrap an existing bean in a parent container with a proxy that will have the same name as the parent bean.

<!-- in the parent context -->
<bean id="accountService" class="com.foo.SimpleAccountService">
    <!-- insert dependencies as required as here -->
</bean>

<!-- in the child (descendant) context -->
<bean id="accountService" <!-- bean name is the same as the parent bean -->
    class="org.springframework.aop.framework.ProxyFactoryBean">
    <property name="target">
        <ref parent="accountService"/> <!-- notice how we refer to the parent bean -->
    </property>
    <!-- insert other configuration and dependencies as required here -->
</bean>

	Note
	The local attribute on the ref element is no longer supported in the 4.0 beans xsd since it does not provide value over a regular bean reference anymore. Simply change your existing ref local references to ref bean when upgrading to the 4.0 schema.

A <bean/> element inside the <property/> or <constructor-arg/> elements defines a so-called inner bean.

<bean id="outer" class="...">
    <!-- instead of using a reference to a target bean, simply define the target bean inline -->
    <property name="target">
        <bean class="com.example.Person"> <!-- this is the inner bean -->
            <property name="name" value="Fiona Apple"/>
            <property name="age" value="25"/>
        </bean>
    </property>
</bean>

An inner bean definition does not require a defined id or name; if specified, the container does not use such a value as an identifier. The container also ignores the scope flag on creation: Inner beans are always anonymous and they are always created with the outer bean. It is not possible to inject inner beans into collaborating beans other than into the enclosing bean or to access them independently.

As a corner case, it is possible to receive destruction callbacks from a custom scope, e.g. for a request-scoped inner bean contained within a singleton bean: The creation of the inner bean instance will be tied to its containing bean, but destruction callbacks allow it to participate in the request scope’s lifecycle. This is not a common scenario; inner beans typically simply share their containing bean’s scope.

In the <list/>, <set/>, <map/>, and <props/> elements, you set the properties and arguments of the Java Collection types List, Set, Map, and Properties, respectively.

<bean id="moreComplexObject" class="example.ComplexObject">
    <!-- results in a setAdminEmails(java.util.Properties) call -->
    <property name="adminEmails">
        <props>
            <prop key="administrator">[email protected] </prop>
            <prop key="support">[email protected] </prop>
            <prop key="development">[email protected] </prop>
        </props>
    </property>
    <!-- results in a setSomeList(java.util.List) call -->
    <property name="someList">
        <list>
            <value>a list element followed by a reference</value>
            <ref bean="myDataSource" />
        </list>
    </property>
    <!-- results in a setSomeMap(java.util.Map) call -->
    <property name="someMap">
        <map>
            <entry key="an entry" value="just some string"/>
            <entry key ="a ref" value-ref="myDataSource"/>
        </map>
    </property>
    <!-- results in a setSomeSet(java.util.Set) call -->
    <property name="someSet">
        <set>
            <value>just some string</value>
            <ref bean="myDataSource" />
        </set>
    </property>
</bean>

The value of a map key or value, or a set value, can also again be any of the following elements:

bean | ref | idref | list | set | map | props | value | null

<beans>
    <bean id="parent" abstract="true" class="example.ComplexObject">
        <property name="adminEmails">
            <props>
                <prop key="administrator">[email protected] </prop>
                <prop key="support">[email protected] </prop>
            </props>
        </property>
    </bean>
    <bean id="child" parent="parent">
        <property name="adminEmails">
            <!-- the merge is specified on the child collection definition -->
            <props merge="true">
                <prop key="sales">[email protected] </prop>
                <prop key="support">[email protected] </prop>
            </props>
        </property>
    </bean>
<beans>

[email protected] 
[email protected] 
[email protected] 

public class Foo {

    private Map<String, Float> accounts;

    public void setAccounts(Map<String, Float> accounts) {
        this.accounts = accounts;
    }
}

<beans>
    <bean id="foo" class="x.y.Foo">
        <property name="accounts">
            <map>
                <entry key="one" value="9.99"/>
                <entry key="two" value="2.75"/>
                <entry key="six" value="3.99"/>
            </map>
        </property>
    </bean>
</beans>

Spring treats empty arguments for properties and the like as empty Strings. The following XML-based configuration metadata snippet sets the email property to the empty String value ("").

<bean class="ExampleBean">
    <property name="email" value=""/>
</bean>

The preceding example is equivalent to the following Java code:

exampleBean.setEmail("");

The <null/> element handles null values. For example:

<bean class="ExampleBean">
    <property name="email">
        <null/>
    </property>
</bean>

The above configuration is equivalent to the following Java code:

exampleBean.setEmail(null);

The p-namespace enables you to use the bean element’s attributes, instead of nested <property/> elements, to describe your property values and/or collaborating beans.

Spring supports extensible configuration formats with namespaces, which are based on an XML Schema definition. The beans configuration format discussed in this chapter is defined in an XML Schema document. However, the p-namespace is not defined in an XSD file and exists only in the core of Spring.

The following example shows two XML snippets that resolve to the same result: The first uses standard XML format and the second uses the p-namespace.

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

    <bean name="classic" class="com.example.ExampleBean">
        <property name="email" value="[email protected] "/>
    </bean>

    <bean name="p-namespace" class="com.example.ExampleBean"
        p:email="[email protected] "/>
</beans>

The example shows an attribute in the p-namespace called email in the bean definition. This tells Spring to include a property declaration. As previously mentioned, the p-namespace does not have a schema definition, so you can set the name of the attribute to the property name.

This next example includes two more bean definitions that both have a reference to another bean:

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

    <bean name="john-classic" class="com.example.Person">
        <property name="name" value="John Doe"/>
        <property name="spouse" ref="jane"/>
    </bean>

    <bean name="john-modern"
        class="com.example.Person"
        p:name="John Doe"
        p:spouse-ref="jane"/>

    <bean name="jane" class="com.example.Person">
        <property name="name" value="Jane Doe"/>
    </bean>
</beans>

As you can see, this example includes not only a property value using the p-namespace, but also uses a special format to declare property references. Whereas the first bean definition uses <property name="spouse" ref="jane"/> to create a reference from bean john to bean jane, the second bean definition uses p:spouse-ref="jane" as an attribute to do the exact same thing. In this case spouse is the property name, whereas the -ref part indicates that this is not a straight value but rather a reference to another bean.

	Note
	The p-namespace is not as flexible as the standard XML format. For example, the format for declaring property references clashes with properties that end in Ref, whereas the standard XML format does not. We recommend that you choose your approach carefully and communicate this to your team members, to avoid producing XML documents that use all three approaches at the same time.

Similar to the the section called “XML shortcut with the p-namespace”, the c-namespace, newly introduced in Spring 3.1, allows usage of inlined attributes for configuring the constructor arguments rather then nested constructor-arg elements.

Let’s review the examples from the section called “Constructor-based dependency injection” with the c: namespace:

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

    <bean id="bar" class="x.y.Bar"/>
    <bean id="baz" class="x.y.Baz"/>

    <!-- traditional declaration -->
    <bean id="foo" class="x.y.Foo">
        <constructor-arg ref="bar"/>
        <constructor-arg ref="baz"/>
        <constructor-arg value="[email protected] "/>
    </bean>

    <!-- c-namespace declaration -->
    <bean id="foo" class="x.y.Foo" c:bar-ref="bar" c:baz-ref="baz" c:email="[email protected] "/>

</beans>

The c: namespace uses the same conventions as the p: one (trailing -ref for bean references) for setting the constructor arguments by their names. And just as well, it needs to be declared even though it is not defined in an XSD schema (but it exists inside the Spring core).

For the rare cases where the constructor argument names are not available (usually if the bytecode was compiled without debugging information), one can use fallback to the argument indexes:

<!-- c-namespace index declaration -->
<bean id="foo" class="x.y.Foo" c:_0-ref="bar" c:_1-ref="baz"/>

	Note
	Due to the XML grammar, the index notation requires the presence of the leading _ as XML attribute names cannot start with a number (even though some IDE allow it).

In practice, the constructor resolution mechanism is quite efficient in matching arguments so unless one really needs to, we recommend using the name notation through-out your configuration.

You can use compound or nested property names when you set bean properties, as long as all components of the path except the final property name are not null. Consider the following bean definition.

<bean id="foo" class="foo.Bar">
    <property name="fred.bob.sammy" value="123" />
</bean>

The foo bean has a fred property, which has a bob property, which has a sammy property, and that final sammy property is being set to the value 123. In order for this to work, the fred property of foo, and the bob property of fred must not be null after the bean is constructed, or a NullPointerException is thrown.

Autowiring works best when it is used consistently across a project. If autowiring is not used in general, it might be confusing to developers to use it to wire only one or two bean definitions.

Consider the limitations and disadvantages of autowiring:

In the latter scenario, you have several options:

On a per-bean basis, you can exclude a bean from autowiring. In Spring’s XML format, set the autowire-candidate attribute of the <bean/> element to false; the container makes that specific bean definition unavailable to the autowiring infrastructure (including annotation style configurations such as @Autowired).

	Note
	The autowire-candidate attribute is designed to only affect type-based autowiring. It does not affect explicit references by name, which will get resolved even if the specified bean is not marked as an autowire candidate. As a consequence, autowiring by name will nevertheless inject a bean if the name matches.

You can also limit autowire candidates based on pattern-matching against bean names. The top-level <beans/> element accepts one or more patterns within its default-autowire-candidates attribute. For example, to limit autowire candidate status to any bean whose name ends with Repository, provide a value of *Repository. To provide multiple patterns, define them in a comma-separated list. An explicit value of true or false for a bean definitions autowire-candidate attribute always takes precedence, and for such beans, the pattern matching rules do not apply.

These techniques are useful for beans that you never want to be injected into other beans by autowiring. It does not mean that an excluded bean cannot itself be configured using autowiring. Rather, the bean itself is not a candidate for autowiring other beans.

Lookup method injection is the ability of the container to override methods on container managed beans, to return the lookup result for another named bean in the container. The lookup typically involves a prototype bean as in the scenario described in the preceding section. The Spring Framework implements this method injection by using bytecode generation from the CGLIB library to generate dynamically a subclass that overrides the method.

Note

For this dynamic subclassing to work, the class that the Spring bean container will subclass cannot be final, and the method to be overridden cannot be final either. Unit-testing a class that has an abstract method requires you to subclass the class yourself and to supply a stub implementation of the abstract method. Concrete methods are also necessary for component scanning which requires concrete classes to pick up. A further key limitation is that lookup methods won’t work with factory methods and in particular not with @Bean methods in configuration classes, since the container is not in charge of creating the instance in that case and therefore cannot create a runtime-generated subclass on the fly.

Looking at the CommandManager class in the previous code snippet, you see that the Spring container will dynamically override the implementation of the createCommand() method. Your CommandManager class will not have any Spring dependencies, as can be seen in the reworked example:

package fiona.apple;

// no more Spring imports!

public abstract class CommandManager {

    public Object process(Object commandState) {
        // grab a new instance of the appropriate Command interface
        Command command = createCommand();
        // set the state on the (hopefully brand new) Command instance
        command.setState(commandState);
        return command.execute();
    }

    // okay... but where is the implementation of this method?
    protected abstract Command createCommand();
}

In the client class containing the method to be injected (the CommandManager in this case), the method to be injected requires a signature of the following form:

<public|protected> [abstract] <return-type> theMethodName(no-arguments);

If the method is abstract, the dynamically-generated subclass implements the method. Otherwise, the dynamically-generated subclass overrides the concrete method defined in the original class. For example:

<!-- a stateful bean deployed as a prototype (non-singleton) -->
<bean id="myCommand" class="fiona.apple.AsyncCommand" scope="prototype">
    <!-- inject dependencies here as required -->
</bean>

<!-- commandProcessor uses statefulCommandHelper -->
<bean id="commandManager" class="fiona.apple.CommandManager">
    <lookup-method name="createCommand" bean="myCommand"/>
</bean>

The bean identified as commandManager calls its own method createCommand() whenever it needs a new instance of the myCommand bean. You must be careful to deploy the myCommand bean as a prototype, if that is actually what is needed. If it is as a singleton, the same instance of the myCommand bean is returned each time.

Alternatively, within the annotation-based component model, you may declare a lookup method through the @Lookup annotation:

public abstract class CommandManager {

    public Object process(Object commandState) {
        Command command = createCommand();
        command.setState(commandState);
        return command.execute();
    }

    @Lookup("myCommand")
    protected abstract Command createCommand();
}

Or, more idiomatically, you may rely on the target bean getting resolved against the declared return type of the lookup method:

public abstract class CommandManager {

    public Object process(Object commandState) {
        MyCommand command = createCommand();
        command.setState(commandState);
        return command.execute();
    }

    @Lookup
    protected abstract MyCommand createCommand();
}

Note that you will typically declare such annotated lookup methods with a concrete stub implementation, in order for them to be compatible with Spring’s component scanning rules where abstract classes get ignored by default. This limitation does not apply in case of explicitly registered or explicitly imported bean classes.

	Tip
	Another way of accessing differently scoped target beans is an ObjectFactory/ Provider injection point. Check out the section called “Scoped beans as dependencies”. The interested reader may also find the ServiceLocatorFactoryBean (in the org.springframework.beans.factory.config package) to be of use.

A less useful form of method injection than lookup method injection is the ability to replace arbitrary methods in a managed bean with another method implementation. Users may safely skip the rest of this section until the functionality is actually needed.

With XML-based configuration metadata, you can use the replaced-method element to replace an existing method implementation with another, for a deployed bean. Consider the following class, with a method computeValue, which we want to override:

public class MyValueCalculator {

    public String computeValue(String input) {
        // some real code...
    }

    // some other methods...
}

A class implementing the org.springframework.beans.factory.support.MethodReplacer interface provides the new method definition.

/**
 * meant to be used to override the existing computeValue(String)
 * implementation in MyValueCalculator
 */
public class ReplacementComputeValue implements MethodReplacer {

    public Object reimplement(Object o, Method m, Object[] args) throws Throwable {
        // get the input value, work with it, and return a computed result
        String input = (String) args[0];
        ...
        return ...;
    }
}

The bean definition to deploy the original class and specify the method override would look like this:

<bean id="myValueCalculator" class="x.y.z.MyValueCalculator">
    <!-- arbitrary method replacement -->
    <replaced-method name="computeValue" replacer="replacementComputeValue">
        <arg-type>String</arg-type>
    </replaced-method>
</bean>

<bean id="replacementComputeValue" class="a.b.c.ReplacementComputeValue"/>

You can use one or more contained <arg-type/> elements within the <replaced-method/> element to indicate the method signature of the method being overridden. The signature for the arguments is necessary only if the method is overloaded and multiple variants exist within the class. For convenience, the type string for an argument may be a substring of the fully qualified type name. For example, the following all match java.lang.String:

java.lang.String
String
Str

Because the number of arguments is often enough to distinguish between each possible choice, this shortcut can save a lot of typing, by allowing you to type only the shortest string that will match an argument type.

To support the scoping of beans at the request, session, globalSession, application, and websocket levels (web-scoped beans), some minor initial configuration is required before you define your beans. (This initial setup is not required for the standard scopes, singleton and prototype.)

How you accomplish this initial setup depends on your particular Servlet environment.

If you access scoped beans within Spring Web MVC, in effect, within a request that is processed by the Spring DispatcherServlet or DispatcherPortlet, then no special setup is necessary: DispatcherServlet and DispatcherPortlet already expose all relevant state.

If you use a Servlet 2.5 web container, with requests processed outside of Spring’s DispatcherServlet (for example, when using JSF or Struts), you need to register the org.springframework.web.context.request.RequestContextListener ServletRequestListener. For Servlet 3.0+, this can be done programmatically via the WebApplicationInitializer interface. Alternatively, or for older containers, add the following declaration to your web application’s web.xml file:

<web-app>
    ...
    <listener>
        <listener-class>
            org.springframework.web.context.request.RequestContextListener
        </listener-class>
    </listener>
    ...
</web-app>

Alternatively, if there are issues with your listener setup, consider using Spring’s RequestContextFilter. The filter mapping depends on the surrounding web application configuration, so you have to change it as appropriate.

<web-app>
    ...
    <filter>
        <filter-name>requestContextFilter</filter-name>
        <filter-class>org.springframework.web.filter.RequestContextFilter</filter-class>
    </filter>
    <filter-mapping>
        <filter-name>requestContextFilter</filter-name>
        <url-pattern>/*</url-pattern>
    </filter-mapping>
    ...
</web-app>

DispatcherServlet, RequestContextListener, and RequestContextFilter all do exactly the same thing, namely bind the HTTP request object to the Thread that is servicing that request. This makes beans that are request- and session-scoped available further down the call chain.

Consider the following XML configuration for a bean definition:

<bean id="loginAction" class="com.foo.LoginAction" scope="request"/>

The Spring container creates a new instance of the LoginAction bean by using the loginAction bean definition for each and every HTTP request. That is, the loginAction bean is scoped at the HTTP request level. You can change the internal state of the instance that is created as much as you want, because other instances created from the same loginAction bean definition will not see these changes in state; they are particular to an individual request. When the request completes processing, the bean that is scoped to the request is discarded.

When using annotation-driven components or Java Config, the @RequestScope annotation can be used to assign a component to the request scope.

@RequestScope
@Component
public class LoginAction {
    // ...
}

Consider the following XML configuration for a bean definition:

<bean id="userPreferences" class="com.foo.UserPreferences" scope="session"/>

The Spring container creates a new instance of the UserPreferences bean by using the userPreferences bean definition for the lifetime of a single HTTP Session. In other words, the userPreferences bean is effectively scoped at the HTTP Session level. As with request-scoped beans, you can change the internal state of the instance that is created as much as you want, knowing that other HTTP Session instances that are also using instances created from the same userPreferences bean definition do not see these changes in state, because they are particular to an individual HTTP Session.