Upgrade to Spring Boot 1.4

Upgrade to Spring Boot 1.4

Spring Boot 1.4 is a big jump, and introduced lots of new test facilities and aligned with the new technology stack, such as Spring framework 4.3 and Hibernate 5.2 and Spring Security 4.1, etc.

Spring Boot 1.4

New starter:spring-boot-starter-test

Spring Boot 1.4 brings a new starter for test scope, named

spring-boot-starter-test

.

Use the following:

<dependency>
<groupId>org.springframework.boot</groupId>
<artifactId>spring-boot-starter-test</artifactId>
<scope>test</scope>
</dependency>

Instead of:

<dependency>
<groupId>com.jayway.jsonpath</groupId>
<artifactId>json-path</artifactId>
<scope>test</scope>
</dependency>

<dependency>
<groupId>org.assertj</groupId>
<artifactId>assertj-core</artifactId>
<scope>test</scope>
</dependency>

<dependency>
<groupId>org.hamcrest</groupId>
<artifactId>hamcrest-core</artifactId>
<scope>test</scope>
</dependency>

<dependency>
<groupId>org.mockito</groupId>
<artifactId>mockito-core</artifactId>
<scope>test</scope>
</dependency>

spring-boot-starter-test

includes the essential dependencies for test, such as json-path, assertj, hamcrest, mockito etc.

New annotation: @SpringBootTest

Spring Boot 1.4 introduced a new annotation

@SpringBootTest

to unite the old

@IntegrationTest

,

@WebIntegrationTest

,

@SpringApplicationConfiguration

etc, in before versions.

A

webEnvironment

property of

@SpringBootTest

is use for deciding if set up a web environment for test.

There are some configuration options of the

webEnvironment

.

MOCK is the default, provides a mock web environment.

NONE does not give a web environment.

DEFINED_PORT provides an embedded web environment and run the application on a defined port.

RANDOM_PORT provides an embedded web environment, but use a random port number.

If RANDOM_PORT is used, add

@LocalSeverPort

annotation on an

int

field will inject the port number at runtime.

@LocalSeverPort
int port;

@LocalServerPort

replaces the

@Value("${local.server.port}")

of Spring Boot 1.3.

Similarly, classes property is similar to the one of

@SpringApplicationConfiguration

. You can specify the configuration classes to be loaded for the test.

@SpringBootTest(classes = {Application.class, SwaggerConfig.class})

The above code is equivalent to

@SpringApplicationConfiguration(classes={...})

in Spring Boot 1.3.

New JUnit Runner: SpringRunner

Spring 1.4 introduced a new JUnit Runner,

SpringRunner

, which is an alias for the

SpringJUnit4ClassRunner

.

@RunWith(SpringRunner.class)

If you have to use other runners instead of

SpringRunner

, and want to use the Spring test context in the tests, declare a

SpringClassRule

and

SpringMethodRule

in the test to fill the gap.

@RunWith(AnotherRunner.class)
public class SomeTest{

@ClassRule
public static final SpringClassRule SPRING_CLASS_RULE = new SpringClassRule();

@Rule
public final SpringMethodRule springMethodRule = new SpringMethodRule();

}

Autoconfigure test slice

The most exciting feature provided in Spring Boot 1.4 is it provides capability to test some feature slice, which just pick up essential beans and configuration for the specific purpose based test.

Currently there is a series of new annotations available for this purpose.

@JsonTest provides a simple Jackson environment to test the json serialization and deserialization.

@WebMvcTest provides a mock web environment, it can specify the controller class for test and inject the

MockMvc

in the test.

@WebMvcTest(PostController.class)
public class PostControllerMvcTest{

@Inject MockMvc mockMvc;

}

@DataJpaTest will prepare an embedded database and provides basic JPA environment for the test.

@RestClientTest provides REST client environment for the test, esp the RestTemplateBuilder etc.

These annotations are not composed with

SpringBootTest

, they are combined with a series of

AutoconfigureXXX

and a

@TypeExcludesFilter

annotations.

Have a look at

@DataJpaTest

.

@Target(ElementType.TYPE)
@Retention(RetentionPolicy.RUNTIME)
@Documented
@Inherited
@BootstrapWith(SpringBootTestContextBootstrapper.class)
@OverrideAutoConfiguration(enabled = false)
@TypeExcludeFilters(DataJpaTypeExcludeFilter.class)
@Transactional
@AutoConfigureCache
@AutoConfigureDataJpa
@AutoConfigureTestDatabase
@AutoConfigureTestEntityManager
@ImportAutoConfiguration
public @interface DataJpaTest {}

You can add your

@AutoconfigureXXX

annotation to override the default config.

@AutoConfigureTestDatabase(replace=NONE)
@DataJpaTest
public class TestClass{
}

JsonComponent

@JsonComponent

is a specific

@Component

to register custome Jackson

JsonSerializer

and

JsonDeserializer

.

For example, custom

JsonSerializer

and

JsonDeserializer

are use for serializing and deserializing

LocalDateTime

instance.

@JsonComponent
@Slf4j
public class LocalDateTimeJsonComponent {

public static class LocalDateTimeSerializer extends JsonSerializer<LocalDateTime> {

@Override
public void serialize(LocalDateTime value, JsonGenerator jgen, SerializerProvider provider) throws IOException {
jgen.writeString(value.atZone(ZoneId.systemDefault()).toInstant().toString());
}
}

public static class LocalDateTimeDeserializer extends JsonDeserializer<LocalDateTime> {

@Override
public LocalDateTime deserialize(JsonParser p, DeserializationContext ctxt) throws IOException, JsonProcessingException {
ObjectCodec codec = p.getCodec();
JsonNode tree = codec.readTree(p);
String dateTimeAsString = tree.textValue();
log.debug("dateTimeString value @" + dateTimeAsString);
return LocalDateTime.ofInstant(Instant.parse(dateTimeAsString), ZoneId.systemDefault());
}
}
}

If you are using the Spring Boot default Jackson configuration, it will be activated by default when the application starts up.

But if you customized a

ObjectMapper

bean in your configuration, the autoconfiguration of

ObjectMapper

is disabled. You have to install

JsonComponentModule

manually, else the

@JsonComponent

beans will not be scanned at all.

@Bean
public Jackson2ObjectMapperBuilder objectMapperBuilder(JsonComponentModule jsonComponentModule) {

Jackson2ObjectMapperBuilder builder = new Jackson2ObjectMapperBuilder();
//...
.modulesToInstall(jsonComponentModule);

return builder;
}

Mocking and spying Beans

Spring Boot 1.4 integrates Mockito tightly, and provides Spring specific

@MockBean

and

@MockSpy

annotations.

@RunWith(SpringRunner.class)public class MockBeanTest {

@MockBean
private UserRepository userRepository;

}

TestConfiguration and TestComponent

TestConfiguration

and

TestComponent

are designated for test purpose, they are similar with

Configuration

and

Component

. Generic

Configuration

and

Component

can not be scanned by default in test.

public class TestClass{

@TestConfiguration
static class TestConfig{
}

@TestComponent
static class TestBean{}

}

Spring 4.3

There are a few features added in 4.3, the following is impressive.

Composed annotations

The effort of Spring Composed are merged into Spring 4.3.

A series of new composed annotations are available, but the naming is a little different from Spring Composed.

For example, a RestController can be simplfied by the new annotations, list as the following table.

Spring 4.2	Spring 4.3
@RequestMapping(value = "", method = RequestMethod.GET)	@GetMapping()
@RequestMapping(value = "", method = RequestMethod.POST)	@PostMapping()
@RequestMapping(value = "/{id}", method = RequestMethod.PUT)	@PutMapping(value = "/{id}")
@RequestMapping(value = "/{id}", method = RequestMethod.DELETE)	@DeleteMapping(value = "/{id}")

A new

@RestControllerAdvice()

is provided for exception handling, it is combination of

@ControllerAdvice

and

@ResponseBody

. You can remove the

@ResponseBody

on the

@ExceptionHandler

method when use this new annotation.

For example, in the old Spring 4.2, an custom exception handler class looks like the following.

@ControllerAdvice()
public class RestExceptionHandler {

@ExceptionHandler(value = {SomeException.class})
@ResponseBody
public ResponseEntity<ResponseMessage> handleGenericException(SomeException ex, WebRequest request) {
}
}

In Spring 4.3, it becomes:

@RestControllerAdvice()
public class RestExceptionHandler {

@ExceptionHandler(value = {SomeException.class})
public ResponseEntity<ResponseMessage> handleGenericException(SomeException ex, WebRequest request) {
}
}

Auto constructor injection

If there is a only one constructor defined in the bean, the arguments as dependencies will be injected by default.

Before 4.3, you have to add

@Inject

or

@Autowired

on the constructor to inject the dependencies.

@RestController
@RequestMapping(value = Constants.URI_API_PREFIX + Constants.URI_POSTS)
public class PostController {

@Inject
public PostController(BlogService blogService) {
this.blogService = blogService;
}
}

@Inject

can be removed in Spring 4.3.

@RestController
@RequestMapping(value = Constants.URI_API_PREFIX + Constants.URI_POSTS)
public class PostController {

public PostController(BlogService blogService) {
this.blogService = blogService;
}
}

Spring Security 4.1

The Java configuration is improved.

Before 4.1, you can configure

passwordEncoder

and

userDetailsService

via

AuthenticationManagerBuilder

.

@Configuration
@Order(SecurityProperties.ACCESS_OVERRIDE_ORDER)
protected static class ApplicationSecurity extends WebSecurityConfigurerAdapter {

@Override
protected void configure(HttpSecurity http) throws Exception {}

@Override
protected void configure(AuthenticationManagerBuilder auth)
throws Exception {
auth
.userDetailsService(new SimpleUserDetailsServiceImpl(userRepository))
.passwordEncoder(passwordEncoder);
}

@Bean
@Override
public AuthenticationManager authenticationManagerBean() throws Exception {
return super.authenticationManagerBean();
}

}

In 4.1,

userDetailsService

and

passwordEncoder

bean can be detected automaticially. No need to wire them by

AuthenticationManagerBuilder

manually. No need to override the

WebSecurityConfigurerAdapter

class and provide a custom configuration, a generic

WebSecurityConfigurerAdapter

bean is enough.

@Bean
public BCryptPasswordEncoder passwordEncoder() {
BCryptPasswordEncoder passwordEncoder = new BCryptPasswordEncoder();
return passwordEncoder;
}

@Bean
public UserDetailsService userDetailsService(UserRepository userRepository){
return new SimpleUserDetailsServiceImpl(userRepository);
}

@Bean
public WebSecurityConfigurerAdapter securityConfig(){
return new WebSecurityConfigurerAdapter() {
@Override
protected void configure(HttpSecurity http) throws Exception {//...}
}

More details can be found in the What’s New in Spring Security 4.1 chapter of Spring Secuirty documentation.

Hibernate 5.2

The biggest change of Hibernate 5.2 is the packages had been reorganised, Hibernate 5.2 is Java 8 ready now.

hibernate-java8 (Java 8 DateTime support) and hibernate-entitymanager (JPA provider bridge) are merged into hibernate-core.

Remove the following dependencies when upgrade to Hibernate 5.2.

<dependency>
<groupId>org.hibernate</groupId>
<artifactId>hibernate-java8</artifactId>
<version>${hibernate.version}</version>
</dependency>
<dependency>
<groupId>org.hibernate</groupId>
<artifactId>hibernate-entitymanager</artifactId>
<version>${hibernate.version}</version>
</dependency>

NOTE:If you are using Spring 4.2 with Hibernate 5.2.0.Final, it could break some dependencis, such as

spring-orm

,

spring-boot-data-jpa-starter

which depends on hibernate-entitymanager. Spring Boot 1.4.0.RC1 and Spring 4.3 GA fixed the issues. But I noticed in the Hibernate 5.2.1.Final, hibernate-entitymanager is back.

Hibernate 5.2 also added Java Stream APIs support, I hope it will be available in the next JPA specification.

Source code

Clone the codes from Github account.

git clone https://github.com/hantsy/angularjs-springmvc-sample-boot