Spring MVC - Hello World Example

The following example shows how to write a simple web based Hello World application using the Spring MVC Framework. To start with, let us have a working Eclipse IDE in place and follow the subsequent steps to develop a Maven based Web Application using the Spring Web Framework.

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.tutorialspoint</groupId>
   <artifactId>hello</artifactId>
   <version>0.0.1-SNAPSHOT</version>
   <packaging>war</packaging>
   <name>hello Maven Webapp</name>
   <url>http://www.tutorialspoint.com</url>
   <properties>
      <project.build.sourceEncoding>UTF-8</project.build.sourceEncoding>
      <maven.compiler.source>24</maven.compiler.source>
      <maven.compiler.target>24</maven.compiler.target>
      <org.springframework.version>7.0.0-M9</org.springframework.version>
   </properties>
   <dependencies>
      <dependency>
         <groupId>junit</groupId>
         <artifactId>junit</artifactId>
         <version>4.13.1</version>
         <scope>test</scope>
      </dependency>
      <dependency>
         <groupId>jakarta.servlet</groupId>
         <artifactId>jakarta.servlet-api</artifactId>
         <version>6.0.0</version>
         <scope>provided</scope>
      </dependency>
      <dependency>
         <groupId>org.springframework</groupId>
         <artifactId>spring-context</artifactId>
         <version>${org.springframework.version}</version>
         <scope>compile</scope>
      </dependency>
      <dependency>
         <groupId>org.springframework</groupId>
         <artifactId>spring-webmvc</artifactId>
         <version>${org.springframework.version}</version>
         <scope>compile</scope>
      </dependency>
   </dependencies>
   <build>
      <finalName>hello</finalName>
      <pluginManagement>
         <plugins>
            <plugin>
               <artifactId>maven-clean-plugin</artifactId>
               <version>3.4.0</version>
            </plugin>
            <plugin>
               <artifactId>maven-resources-plugin</artifactId>
               <version>3.3.1</version>
            </plugin>
            <plugin>
               <artifactId>maven-compiler-plugin</artifactId>
               <version>3.13.0</version>
            </plugin>
            <plugin>
               <artifactId>maven-surefire-plugin</artifactId>
               <version>3.3.0</version>
            </plugin>
            <plugin>
               <artifactId>maven-war-plugin</artifactId>
               <version>3.4.0</version>
            </plugin>
            <plugin>
            <artifactId>maven-install-plugin</artifactId>
               <version>3.1.2</version>
            </plugin>
            <plugin>
               <artifactId>maven-deploy-plugin</artifactId>
               <version>3.1.2</version>
            </plugin>
         </plugins>
      </pluginManagement>
   </build>
</project>

HelloController.java

package com.tutorialspoint;

import org.springframework.stereotype.Controller;
import org.springframework.ui.ModelMap;
import org.springframework.web.bind.annotation.GetMapping;
import org.springframework.web.bind.annotation.RequestMapping;

@Controller
@RequestMapping("/hello")
public class HelloController{
 
   @GetMapping
   public String printHello(ModelMap model) {
      model.addAttribute("message", "Hello Spring MVC Framework!");
      return "hello";
   }
}

web.xml

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<web-app version="4.0"
   xmlns="http://xmlns.jcp.org/xml/ns/javaee"
   xmlns:javaee="http://xmlns.jcp.org/xml/ns/javaee"
   xmlns:xml="http://www.w3.org/XML/1998/namespace"
   xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
   xsi:schemaLocation="http://xmlns.jcp.org/xml/ns/javaee http://xmlns.jcp.org/xml/ns/javaee/web-app_4_0.xsd">
   <display-name>Spring MVC Application</display-name>

   <servlet>
      <servlet-name>hello</servlet-name>
      <servlet-class>
         org.springframework.web.servlet.DispatcherServlet
      </servlet-class>
      <load-on-startup>1</load-on-startup>
   </servlet>

   <servlet-mapping>
      <servlet-name>hello</servlet-name>
      <url-pattern>/</url-pattern>
   </servlet-mapping>
</web-app>

hello-servlet.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.tutorialspoint" />

   <bean class = "org.springframework.web.servlet.view.InternalResourceViewResolver">
      <property name = "prefix" value = "/WEB-INF/jsp/" />
      <property name = "suffix" value = ".jsp" />
   </bean>
 
</beans>

hello.jsp

<%@ page contentType = "text/html; charset = UTF-8" %>
<html>
   <head>
      <title>Hello World</title>
   </head>
   <body>
      <h2>${message}</h2>
   </body>
</html>

Once you are done with creating source and configuration files, create the war file using maven install command and save your hello.war file available in /target folder in Tomcat's webapps folder.

Now start your Tomcat server and make sure you are able to access other webpages from webapps folder using a standard browser. Now, try to access the URL − http://localhost:8080/hello/hello. If everything is fine with the Spring Web Application, we will see the following screen.

You should note that in the given URL, hello is the application name and hello is the virtual subfolder, which we have mentioned in our controller using @GetMapping("/hello"). You can use direct root while mapping your URL using @GetMapping(), in this case you can access the same page using short URL http://localhost:8080/hello/, but it is advised to have different functionalities under different folders.