Spring forward tutorial

last modified October 18, 2023

Spring forward tutorial shows how to forward a request in a Spring web application.

Spring is a popular Java application framework for creating enterprise applications.

Forward

The special forward: prefix in a view name performs a forward to different URL. Forwarding a URL transfers the request internally within the same server without involving the client browser. Forwards are performed less often than redirects.

Redirect vs Forward

A request can be basically processed in three ways: a) resolved by Spring in a controller action, b) forwarded to a different controller action, c) redirected to client to fetch another URL.

Forward:

performed internally by Spring
the browser is completely unaware of forward, so its original URL remains intact
a browser reload of the resulting page repeats the original request, with the original URL
data sent in the request is available to the forwarded action

Redirect:

is a two step process
Spring instructs the browser to fetch a second URL, which differs from the original
a browser reload of the second URL will not repeat the original request, but will rather fetch the second URL
data sent in the original request scope is not available to the second request

Spring Forward example

The following application uses forwards to a different URL after a form submission. It performs a forward with the forward: prefix.

pom.xml
src
├───main
│   ├───java
│   │   └───com
│   │       └───zetcode
│   │           ├───config
│   │           │       MyWebInitializer.java
│   │           │       WebConfig.java
│   │           └───controller
│   │                   MyController.java
│   └───resources
│       │   logback.xml
│       │
│       └───templates
│               show.ftl
└───test
    └───java

This is the project structure.

pom.xml

<?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 
         http://maven.apache.org/xsd/maven-4.0.0.xsd">
    <modelVersion>4.0.0</modelVersion>

    <groupId>com.zetcode</groupId>
    <artifactId>springforwardex</artifactId>
    <version>1.0-SNAPSHOT</version>
    <packaging>war</packaging>

    <properties>
        <project.build.sourceEncoding>UTF-8</project.build.sourceEncoding>
        <maven.compiler.source>17</maven.compiler.source>
        <maven.compiler.target>17</maven.compiler.target>
        <spring-version>5.3.23</spring-version>
    </properties>

    <dependencies>

        <dependency>
            <groupId>ch.qos.logback</groupId>
            <artifactId>logback-classic</artifactId>
            <version>1.4.0</version>
        </dependency>

        <dependency>
            <groupId>javax.servlet</groupId>
            <artifactId>javax.servlet-api</artifactId>
            <version>4.0.1</version>
            <scope>provided</scope>
        </dependency>

        <dependency>
            <groupId>org.springframework</groupId>
            <artifactId>spring-webmvc</artifactId>
            <version>5.3.23</version>
        </dependency>

        <dependency>
            <groupId>org.springframework</groupId>
            <artifactId>spring-context-support</artifactId>
            <version>5.3.23</version>
        </dependency>

        <dependency>
            <groupId>org.freemarker</groupId>
            <artifactId>freemarker</artifactId>
            <version>2.3.28</version>
        </dependency>

    </dependencies>

    <build>
        <plugins>

            <plugin>
                <groupId>org.apache.maven.plugins</groupId>
                <artifactId>maven-war-plugin</artifactId>
                <version>3.3.2</version>
            </plugin>

            <plugin>
                <groupId>org.eclipse.jetty</groupId>
                <artifactId>jetty-maven-plugin</artifactId>
                <version>9.4.49.v20220914</version>
            </plugin>

        </plugins>
    </build>
</project>

In the pom.xml we have the necessary dependencies.

resources/logback.xml

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<configuration>
    <logger name="org.springframework" level="ERROR"/>
    <logger name="com.zetcode" level="INFO"/>

    <appender name="consoleAppender" class="ch.qos.logback.core.ConsoleAppender">
        <encoder>
            <Pattern>%d{HH:mm:ss.SSS} %blue(%-5level) %magenta(%logger{36}) - %msg %n
            </Pattern>
        </encoder>
    </appender>

    <root>
        <level value="INFO" />
        <appender-ref ref="consoleAppender" />
    </root>
</configuration>

The logback.xml is a configuration file for the Logback logging library.

com/zetcode/config/MyWebInitializer.java

package com.zetcode.config;

import org.springframework.context.annotation.Configuration;
import org.springframework.web.servlet.support.AbstractAnnotationConfigDispatcherServletInitializer;

@Configuration
public class MyWebInitializer extends
        AbstractAnnotationConfigDispatcherServletInitializer {

    @Override
    protected Class<?>[] getRootConfigClasses() {
        return null;
    }

    @Override
    protected Class<?>[] getServletConfigClasses() {
        
        return new Class[]{WebConfig.class};
    }

    @Override
    protected String[] getServletMappings() {
        
        return new String[]{"/"};
    }
}

MyWebInitializer registers the Spring DispatcherServlet, which is a front controller for a Spring web application.

@Override
protected Class<?>[] getServletConfigClasses() {
    
    return new Class[]{WebConfig.class};
}

The getServletConfigClasses returns a web configuration class.

com/zetcode/config/WebConfig.java

package com.zetcode.config;

import org.springframework.context.annotation.Bean;
import org.springframework.context.annotation.ComponentScan;
import org.springframework.context.annotation.Configuration;
import org.springframework.web.servlet.config.annotation.EnableWebMvc;
import org.springframework.web.servlet.config.annotation.WebMvcConfigurer;
import org.springframework.web.servlet.view.freemarker.FreeMarkerConfigurer;
import org.springframework.web.servlet.view.freemarker.FreeMarkerViewResolver;

@Configuration
@EnableWebMvc
@ComponentScan(basePackages = {"com.zetcode"})
public class WebConfig implements WebMvcConfigurer {

    @Bean
    public FreeMarkerViewResolver freemarkerViewResolver() {

        var resolver = new FreeMarkerViewResolver();
        resolver.setCache(true);
        resolver.setSuffix(".ftl");
        return resolver;
    }

    @Bean
    public FreeMarkerConfigurer freemarkerConfig() {

        var freeMarkerConfigurer = new FreeMarkerConfigurer();
        freeMarkerConfigurer.setTemplateLoaderPath("classpath:/templates/");
        return freeMarkerConfigurer;
    }
}

WebConfig configures Freemarker. We set the template files location to templates directory on the classpath. (The resources is on the classpath.)

com/zetcode/controller/MyController.java

package com.zetcode.controller;

import org.slf4j.Logger;
import org.slf4j.LoggerFactory;
import org.springframework.stereotype.Controller;
import org.springframework.ui.Model;
import org.springframework.web.bind.annotation.GetMapping;
import org.springframework.web.bind.annotation.RequestParam;

@Controller
public class MyController {

    private static final Logger logger = LoggerFactory.getLogger(MyController.class);

    @GetMapping(value = "/sendname")
    public String send(@RequestParam(defaultValue = "guest") String name, Model model) {

        logger.info("sendname called");

        model.addAttribute("name", name);

        return "forward:/newpage";
    }

    @GetMapping(value = "/newpage")
    public String newpage() {

        logger.info("newpage called");

        return "show";
    }
}

MyController provides two GET mappings.

@GetMapping(value = "/sendname")
public String send(@RequestParam(defaultValue = "guest") String name, Model model) {

    logger.info("send name called");

    model.addAttribute("name", name);

    return "forward:/newpage";
}

A request sent to /sendname is processed by send action. A request parameter is read and added to the model. In the end, it is forwarded to a new controller action.

@GetMapping(value = "/newpage")
public String newpage() {

    logger.info("newpage called");

    return "show";
}

The newpage action resolves the request to a show view.

resources/templates/show.ftl

<!DOCTYPE html>
<html lang="en">
<head>
    <meta charset="UTF-8">
    <title>Show</title>
    <meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1">
</head>
<body>

<p>
User name: ${name}
</p>

</body>
</html>

The show.ftl display the user name.

$ mvn jetty:run

We run the server and locate to localhost:8080/sendname?name=Peter.

09:52:11.636 INFO  com.zetcode.controller.MyController - sendname called 
09:52:11.653 INFO  com.zetcode.controller.MyController - newpage called

The server log contains these lines.

In this article we have performed a forward in a Spring controller.

Author

My name is Jan Bodnar, and I am a passionate programmer with extensive programming experience. I have been writing programming articles since 2007. To date, I have authored over 1,400 articles and 8 e-books. I possess more than ten years of experience in teaching programming.

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