Spring MVC HelloWorld Using Maven in Eclipse

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Java developers often rely on examples to learn Spring framework. Simple examples are often a key learning resource. There are many Spring MVC HelloWorld applications. However, most of them are outdated (do not integrate Maven, use old version of Spring, etc) or not complete (missing key steps or file hierarchy view). Therefore can not lead to a perfectly working Hello World. In this article, I will show steps for creating a Spring MVC HelloWorld application using Maven in Eclipse. All files’s content and locations are illustrated.

Prerequisite

Step 1: Create a Maven Project

Create a Maven project by following the following steps:

spring-helloworld-maven-1

spring-helloworld-maven-2

Select “webapp”.

spring-helloworld-maven-3

spring-helloworld-maven-4

GroupId identifies the project uniquely across all projects, so we need to enforce a naming schema. ArtifactId is the name of the jar without version. For more information about each field, check out the official page about maven naming convention. (You can do this later. It makes more sense, when you complete the project first.)

After the Maven project is created, the project in the Navigator view should look like the following:

spring-mvc-helloworld-navigator-view1

As shown above, there is an error marked with red. If you open index.jsp file, you can see the error message:
spring-mvc-helloworld-navigator-view2

The superclass "javax.servlet.http.HttpServlet" was not found on the Java Build Path

To fix the problem, right click on project -> Properties -> Java Build Path -> Add Library…-> Server Runtime -> Apache Tomcat -> Finish.

Step 2: Configure Spring

To make a Spring web application, we need to configure several xml files. First of all, we need to add Spring dependencies. Edit the automatically generated pom.xml file to be the following:

pom.xml

<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>com.programcreek</groupId>
	<artifactId>HelloWorld</artifactId>
	<packaging>war</packaging>
	<version>0.0.1-SNAPSHOT</version>
	<name>HelloWorld Maven Webapp</name>
	<url>http://maven.apache.org</url>
 
	<properties>
		<spring.version>4.0.1.RELEASE</spring.version>
	</properties>
	<dependencies>
		<dependency>
			<groupId>junit</groupId>
			<artifactId>junit</artifactId>
			<version>3.8.1</version>
			<scope>test</scope>
		</dependency>
		<!-- Spring dependencies -->
		<dependency>
			<groupId>org.springframework</groupId>
			<artifactId>spring-core</artifactId>
			<version>${spring.version}</version>
		</dependency>
 
		<dependency>
			<groupId>org.springframework</groupId>
			<artifactId>spring-web</artifactId>
			<version>${spring.version}</version>
		</dependency>
 
		<dependency>
			<groupId>org.springframework</groupId>
			<artifactId>spring-webmvc</artifactId>
			<version>${spring.version}</version>
		</dependency>
 
	</dependencies>
 
 
	<build>
		<finalName>HelloWorld</finalName>
	</build>
</project>

Edit the default web.xml.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<web-app xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance" xmlns="http://java.sun.com/xml/ns/javaee" xsi:schemaLocation="http://java.sun.com/xml/ns/javaee http://java.sun.com/xml/ns/javaee/web-app_3_0.xsd" id="WebApp_ID" version="3.0">
 
 
	<display-name>Archetype Created Web Application</display-name>
 
	<servlet>
		<servlet-name>dispatcher</servlet-name>
		<servlet-class>
			org.springframework.web.servlet.DispatcherServlet
		</servlet-class>
		<load-on-startup>1</load-on-startup>
	</servlet>
 
	<servlet-mapping>
		<servlet-name>dispatcher</servlet-name>
		<url-pattern>/</url-pattern>
	</servlet-mapping>
 
	<context-param>
		<param-name>contextConfigLocation</param-name>
		<param-value>/WEB-INF/dispatcher-servlet.xml</param-value>
	</context-param>
 
	<listener>
		<listener-class>
			org.springframework.web.context.ContextLoaderListener
		</listener-class>
	</listener>
</web-app>

Create an xml file “dispatcher-servlet.xml” under the same directory of web.xml.

<beans xmlns="http://www.springframework.org/schema/beans"
	xmlns:context="http://www.springframework.org/schema/context"
	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-3.0.xsd
http://www.springframework.org/schema/context
http://www.springframework.org/schema/context/spring-context-3.0.xsd">
 
	<context:component-scan base-package="com.programcreek.helloworld.controller" />
 
	<bean
		class="org.springframework.web.servlet.view.InternalResourceViewResolver">
		<property name="prefix">
			<value>/WEB-INF/views/</value>
		</property>
		<property name="suffix">
			<value>.jsp</value>
		</property>
	</bean>
</beans>

In the above xml file, base-package specifies the package of the controllers. prefix specifies the directory of views, and it is set to be /WEB-INF/views/, which means views directory should be created under WEB-INF. suffix specifies the file extension of views. For example, given a view “helloworld”, the view will be located as /WEB-INF/views/helloworld.jsp. You can figure this out later in Step 3.

Step 3: Create Spring Controller and View

Create the HelloWorldController under src/main/java/ directory.

HelloWorldController.java

package com.programcreek.helloworld.controller;
 
import org.springframework.stereotype.Controller;
import org.springframework.ui.Model;
import org.springframework.web.bind.annotation.RequestMapping;
import org.springframework.web.bind.annotation.RequestParam;
import org.springframework.web.servlet.ModelAndView;
 
@Controller
public class HelloWorldController {
	String message = "Welcome to Spring MVC!";
 
	@RequestMapping("/hello")
	public ModelAndView showMessage(
			@RequestParam(value = "name", required = false, defaultValue = "World") String name) {
		System.out.println("in controller");
 
		ModelAndView mv = new ModelAndView("helloworld");
		mv.addObject("message", message);
		mv.addObject("name", name);
		return mv;
	}
}

In the code above, @RequestMapping annotation maps web requests onto specific handler classes and/or handler methods, in this case, showMessage(). It provides a consistent style between Servlet and Portlet environments, with the semantics adapting to the concrete environment.

RequestParam indicates that a method parameter should be bound to a web request parameter. In this case, we also make it not required and give it a default value.

new ModelAndView("helloworld") determines that helloworld is the target view.

index.jsp

<%@ page language="java" contentType="text/html; charset=ISO-8859-1"
 
pageEncoding="ISO-8859-1"%>
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/loose.dtd">
<html>
<head>
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=ISO-8859-1">
<title>Spring 4 MVC - HelloWorld Index Page</title>
</head>
<body>
 
	<center>
		<h2>Hello World</h2>
		<h3>
			<a href="hello?name=Eric">Click Here</a>
		</h3>
	</center>
</body>
</html>

Create the helloworld.jsp file under /WEB-INF/views/ directory.

helloworld.jsp

<%@ page language="java" contentType="text/html; charset=ISO-8859-1" pageEncoding="ISO-8859-1"%>
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/loose.dtd">
<html>
<head>
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=ISO-8859-1">
<title>Spring 4 MVC -HelloWorld</title>
</head>
<body>
	<center>
		<h2>Hello World</h2>
		<h2>
			${message} ${name}
		</h2>
	</center>
</body>
</html>

${variable} will be converted to the value of the variable.

Final Navigator view of the project:
spring-helloworld-final-view

Step 4: Run on Server

Right click the project and select Run As –> Run on Server.

hello-world-spring

hello-world-spring-2

Project zip file for download.

Next: Dependency Injection and XML Configuration

53 thoughts on “Spring MVC HelloWorld Using Maven in Eclipse”

  2. (Sorry, some “important codes” lost after post, so try again)
    I’m beginner to SpringMVC and meet following two questions and resolved:
    ——–(questions)———-
    1. See the console “in controller” in Eclipse, but got HTTP Status 404 in my browser
    2. Still show ${message} and ${name} (jsp Expression Language notwork)
    ——–(solutions)———-
    1. Wrong folder name:
    In my “dispatcher-servlet.xml”

    /WEB-INF/views/

    but I named my folder under WEB-INF “view”,
    so just resolved by changing the “views” in tag to “view”.

    2. Add to helloword.jsp
    In the first line of “helloword.jsp”, add
    You can see more information here:
    http://www.codejava.net/java-ee/jsp/activating-and-deactivating-el-evaluation-in-jsp
    —————————–
    Hope it helps

  3. I’m beginner to SpringMVC and meet following two questions and resolved:
    ——–(questions)———-
    1. HTTP Status 404
    2. still show ${message} and ${name} (jsp Expression Language notwork)
    ——–(solutions)———-
    1. Wrong folder name:
    In my “dispatcher-servlet.xml”

    /WEB-INF/views/

    but I named my folder under WEB-INF “view”,
    so just resolved by changing the “views” in tag to “view”.

    2. Add to helloword.jsp
    In the first line of “helloword.jsp”, add
    You can see more information here:
    http://www.codejava.net/java-ee/jsp/activating-and-deactivating-el-evaluation-in-jsp
    —————————–
    Hope it helps

  4. When the model values passed in the controller are not visible on the generated page, thus you get
    ${message} ${name} instead of “Welcome to Spring MVC! Eric”,
    it might be that your web.xml is not of the proper version. In my case it was version 2.3 (the web.xml was created automatically by eclipse) and had to upgrade it to version 3.
    (note, I am using Spring MVC version 4.3.11 and Tomcat version 8.5.20).

    My web.xml now begins with:

  5. Excellent Article! Author explains the steps so well. Keep up the good work. I look forward to more such articles from you. It worked first time, I tried and taught me the basics.

    Regards
    Kalyan

  17. -1:-1 31:3 The declaration for the entity “HTML.Version” must end with ‘>’. does anyone knows how to solve this ?

  20. Getting This error

    Tomcat 8

    quick response would be appriciated

    Jan 27, 2016 4:48:47 PM org.apache.catalina.core.StandardWrapperValve invoke

    SEVERE: Servlet.service() for servlet [dispatcher] in context with path [/SPRINGMVC1] threw exception [Servlet execution threw an exception] with root cause

    java.lang.NoSuchMethodError: org.springframework.http.HttpMethod.matches(Ljava/lang/String;)Z

    at org.springframework.web.servlet.FrameworkServlet.service(FrameworkServlet.java:841)

    at javax.servlet.http.HttpServlet.service(HttpServlet.java:729)

    at org.apache.catalina.core.ApplicationFilterChain.internalDoFilter(ApplicationFilterChain.java:291)

    at org.apache.catalina.core.ApplicationFilterChain.doFilter(ApplicationFilterChain.java:206)

    at org.apache.tomcat.websocket.server.WsFilter.doFilter(WsFilter.java:52)

    at org.apache.catalina.core.ApplicationFilterChain.internalDoFilter(ApplicationFilterChain.java:239)

    at org.apache.catalina.core.ApplicationFilterChain.doFilter(ApplicationFilterChain.java:206)

    at org.apache.catalina.core.StandardWrapperValve.invoke(StandardWrapperValve.java:212)

    at org.apache.catalina.core.StandardContextValve.invoke(StandardContextValve.java:106)

    at org.apache.catalina.authenticator.AuthenticatorBase.invoke(AuthenticatorBase.java:502)

    at org.apache.catalina.core.StandardHostValve.invoke(StandardHostValve.java:141)

    at org.apache.catalina.valves.ErrorReportValve.invoke(ErrorReportValve.java:79)

    at org.apache.catalina.valves.AbstractAccessLogValve.invoke(AbstractAccessLogValve.java:616)

    at org.apache.catalina.core.StandardEngineValve.invoke(StandardEngineValve.java:88)

    at org.apache.catalina.connector.CoyoteAdapter.service(CoyoteAdapter.java:521)

    at org.apache.coyote.http11.AbstractHttp11Processor.process(AbstractHttp11Processor.java:1096)

    at org.apache.coyote.AbstractProtocol$AbstractConnectionHandler.process(AbstractProtocol.java:674)

    at org.apache.tomcat.util.net.NioEndpoint$SocketProcessor.doRun(NioEndpoint.java:1500)

    at org.apache.tomcat.util.net.NioEndpoint$SocketProcessor.run(NioEndpoint.java:1456)

    at java.util.concurrent.ThreadPoolExecutor.runWorker(Unknown Source)

    at java.util.concurrent.ThreadPoolExecutor$Worker.run(Unknown Source)

    at org.apache.tomcat.util.threads.TaskThread$WrappingRunnable.run(TaskThread.java:61)

    at java.lang.Thread.run(Unknown Source)

  21. Getting this error.. any help is appreciated.

    HTTP Status 404 – /HelloSpring/

    type Status report

    message /HelloSpring/

    description The requested resource is not available.

    Apache Tomcat/8.0.28

  22. i know this is a little old one but i am getting error on ${message} ${name}. could someone help out please.
    thanks

  24. when i build tomcat,the tomcat localhost log:Error configuring application listener of class org.springframework.web.context.ContextLoaderListener

  25. ${variable} is not converted to the value of the variable in my case. Am I missing something? I followed all steps carefully.. Can you please help?

  26. When I create the Maven project in Eclipse, the .classpath xml file and .project xml files are not generated. Also I this error. Which spring version did you write in pom.xml?

    Pls help

  27. When I create the Maven project in Eclipse, the .classpath xml file and .project xml files are not generated. Also I this error. Pls help.

  28. I have performed all the steps as suggested but, I am getting page not found error when I click on the link which goes to helloworld.jsp. Actually, it gets navigated to the helloworld.jsp page, but, shows the following error on console:
    Servlet /HelloWorldSpring threw load() exception
    java.lang.NoSuchMethodError: org.springframework.core.convert.converter.ConverterRegistry.addConverter(Ljava/lang/Class;Ljava/lang/Class;Lorg/springframework/core/convert/converter/Converter;)V

    Kindly help.

  29. Awesome work dude…but u skipped first time server setup part which took a lot of time of mine…anyways great work !!!

  30. Thanks.

    When I am trying to work this initially I met some problems. But once made correct entries in pom.xml file, this example is working perfectly.
    Important point. : you are missing to add spring context enteries in the pom.xml file. Please add that.
    Final pom file I have used is,

    4.0.0
    com.madrone.lmsapp
    lmsapp
    war
    0.0.1-SNAPSHOT
    lmsapp Maven Webapp
    http://maven.apache.org

    junit
    junit
    3.8.1
    test

    org.springframework
    spring-core
    4.1.4.RELEASE

    org.springframework
    spring-web
    4.1.4.RELEASE

    org.springframework
    spring-webmvc
    4.1.4.RELEASE

    org.springframework
    spring-context
    4.1.4.RELEASE

    lmsapp

  33. HTTP Status 404 – /HelloWorld/

    type Status report

    message /HelloWorld/

    description The requested resource is not available.

    Pivotal tc Runtime 3.0.2.SR2/8.0.15.B.RELEASE

    Please help me to resolve this problem.

  39. Hello Sebastian

    you might be using an old version of JSP 1.2 , please use JSP 2.0 ( check declaration in web.xml )

    or

    use following directive in jsp

  40. Hi I run it on server and i get : ${message} ${name} instead of “Welcome to Spring MVC! Eric” what could be the problem here ?

  41. HTTP Status 404 – /HelloWorld/

    type Status report

    message /HelloWorld/

    description The requested resource is not available.

    Pivotal tc Runtime 3.0.2.SR2/8.0.15.B.RELEASE

    Please help me to resolve this problem.

  44. Hi Chris,

    I guess you didn’t set dispatcher-servlet.xml correctly. If you make a project with your own name, please modify the with your package to link the HellowWorldController.java.

    Best regards.

  45. Hello, I get error
    No mapping found for HTTP request with URI [/WebDemo/hello] in DispatcherServlet with name ‘dispatcher’

    whats wrong?

  49. Thanks for a useful post.
    But in my case, I had to remove id=”WebApp_ID” from web.xml so that my Geronimo server run with name HelloWorld, not WebApp_ID. 😉

  50. Nice tutorial but you shouldn’t have to worry about these types of
    things anymore… it’s time consuming. Use the Jigy Generator to create
    your project with Spring completely configured for you. Jigy
    Generator reverse engineers your database to create all your DAO’s,
    domain objects and validators… Plus you have certain things that
    just work out of the box like login, authentication, file upload etc.
    Jigy Generator can be downloaded at http://www.getjigy.com

  53. Please note that your tags are out of order in the web.xml file you specify, which causes Eclipse to complain. To get it to work, I had to re-order them according to the DTD (http://svn.apache.org/repos/asf/beehive/trunk/netui/external/struts/web-app_2_3.dtd) to look like this:

    Archetype Created Web Application

    contextConfigLocation

    /WEB-INF/dispatcher-servlet.xml

    org.springframework.web.context.ContextLoaderListener

    dispatcher

    org.springframework.web.servlet.DispatcherServlet

    1

    dispatcher

    /

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