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Composing Java-based Configurations

Spring’s Java-based configuration feature lets you compose annotations, which can reduce the complexity of your configuration.

Using the @Import Annotation

Much as the <import/> element is used within Spring XML files to aid in modularizing configurations, the @Import annotation allows for loading @Bean definitions from another configuration class, as the following example shows:

  • Java

  • Kotlin

@Configuration
public class ConfigA {

	@Bean
	public A a() {
		return new A();
	}
}

@Configuration
@Import(ConfigA.class)
public class ConfigB {

	@Bean
	public B b() {
		return new B();
	}
}
@Configuration
class ConfigA {

	@Bean
	fun a() = A()
}

@Configuration
@Import(ConfigA::class)
class ConfigB {

	@Bean
	fun b() = B()
}

Now, rather than needing to specify both ConfigA.class and ConfigB.class when instantiating the context, only ConfigB needs to be supplied explicitly, as the following example shows:

  • Java

  • Kotlin

public static void main(String[] args) {
	ApplicationContext ctx = new AnnotationConfigApplicationContext(ConfigB.class);

	// now both beans A and B will be available...
	A a = ctx.getBean(A.class);
	B b = ctx.getBean(B.class);
}
import org.springframework.beans.factory.getBean

fun main() {
	val ctx = AnnotationConfigApplicationContext(ConfigB::class.java)

	// now both beans A and B will be available...
	val a = ctx.getBean<A>()
	val b = ctx.getBean<B>()
}

This approach simplifies container instantiation, as only one class needs to be dealt with, rather than requiring you to remember a potentially large number of @Configuration classes during construction.

As of Spring Framework 4.2, @Import also supports references to regular component classes, analogous to the AnnotationConfigApplicationContext.register method. This is particularly useful if you want to avoid component scanning, by using a few configuration classes as entry points to explicitly define all your components.

Injecting Dependencies on Imported @Bean Definitions

The preceding example works but is simplistic. In most practical scenarios, beans have dependencies on one another across configuration classes. When using XML, this is not an issue, because no compiler is involved, and you can declare ref="someBean" and trust Spring to work it out during container initialization. When using @Configuration classes, the Java compiler places constraints on the configuration model, in that references to other beans must be valid Java syntax.

Fortunately, solving this problem is simple. As we already discussed, a @Bean method can have an arbitrary number of parameters that describe the bean dependencies. Consider the following more realistic scenario with several @Configuration classes, each depending on beans declared in the others:

  • Java

  • Kotlin

@Configuration
public class ServiceConfig {

	@Bean
	public TransferService transferService(AccountRepository accountRepository) {
		return new TransferServiceImpl(accountRepository);
	}
}

@Configuration
public class RepositoryConfig {

	@Bean
	public AccountRepository accountRepository(DataSource dataSource) {
		return new JdbcAccountRepository(dataSource);
	}
}

@Configuration
@Import({ServiceConfig.class, RepositoryConfig.class})
public class SystemTestConfig {

	@Bean
	public DataSource dataSource() {
		// return new DataSource
	}
}

public static void main(String[] args) {
	ApplicationContext ctx = new AnnotationConfigApplicationContext(SystemTestConfig.class);
	// everything wires up across configuration classes...
	TransferService transferService = ctx.getBean(TransferService.class);
	transferService.transfer(100.00, "A123", "C456");
}
import org.springframework.beans.factory.getBean

@Configuration
class ServiceConfig {

	@Bean
	fun transferService(accountRepository: AccountRepository): TransferService {
		return TransferServiceImpl(accountRepository)
	}
}

@Configuration
class RepositoryConfig {

	@Bean
	fun accountRepository(dataSource: DataSource): AccountRepository {
		return JdbcAccountRepository(dataSource)
	}
}

@Configuration
@Import(ServiceConfig::class, RepositoryConfig::class)
class SystemTestConfig {

	@Bean
	fun dataSource(): DataSource {
		// return new DataSource
	}
}


fun main() {
	val ctx = AnnotationConfigApplicationContext(SystemTestConfig::class.java)
	// everything wires up across configuration classes...
	val transferService = ctx.getBean<TransferService>()
	transferService.transfer(100.00, "A123", "C456")
}

There is another way to achieve the same result. Remember that @Configuration classes are ultimately only another bean in the container: This means that they can take advantage of @Autowired and @Value injection and other features the same as any other bean.

Make sure that the dependencies you inject that way are of the simplest kind only. @Configuration classes are processed quite early during the initialization of the context, and forcing a dependency to be injected this way may lead to unexpected early initialization. Whenever possible, resort to parameter-based injection, as in the preceding example.

Avoid access to locally defined beans within a @PostConstruct method on the same configuration class. This effectively leads to a circular reference since non-static @Bean methods semantically require a fully initialized configuration class instance to be called on. With circular references disallowed (e.g. in Spring Boot 2.6+), this may trigger a BeanCurrentlyInCreationException.

Also, be particularly careful with BeanPostProcessor and BeanFactoryPostProcessor definitions through @Bean. Those should usually be declared as static @Bean methods, not triggering the instantiation of their containing configuration class. Otherwise, @Autowired and @Value may not work on the configuration class itself, since it is possible to create it as a bean instance earlier than AutowiredAnnotationBeanPostProcessor.

The following example shows how one bean can be autowired to another bean:

  • Java

  • Kotlin

@Configuration
public class ServiceConfig {

	@Autowired
	private AccountRepository accountRepository;

	@Bean
	public TransferService transferService() {
		return new TransferServiceImpl(accountRepository);
	}
}

@Configuration
public class RepositoryConfig {

	private final DataSource dataSource;

	public RepositoryConfig(DataSource dataSource) {
		this.dataSource = dataSource;
	}

	@Bean
	public AccountRepository accountRepository() {
		return new JdbcAccountRepository(dataSource);
	}
}

@Configuration
@Import({ServiceConfig.class, RepositoryConfig.class})
public class SystemTestConfig {

	@Bean
	public DataSource dataSource() {
		// return new DataSource
	}
}

public static void main(String[] args) {
	ApplicationContext ctx = new AnnotationConfigApplicationContext(SystemTestConfig.class);
	// everything wires up across configuration classes...
	TransferService transferService = ctx.getBean(TransferService.class);
	transferService.transfer(100.00, "A123", "C456");
}
import org.springframework.beans.factory.getBean

@Configuration
class ServiceConfig {

	@Autowired
	lateinit var accountRepository: AccountRepository

	@Bean
	fun transferService(): TransferService {
		return TransferServiceImpl(accountRepository)
	}
}

@Configuration
class RepositoryConfig(private val dataSource: DataSource) {

	@Bean
	fun accountRepository(): AccountRepository {
		return JdbcAccountRepository(dataSource)
	}
}

@Configuration
@Import(ServiceConfig::class, RepositoryConfig::class)
class SystemTestConfig {

	@Bean
	fun dataSource(): DataSource {
		// return new DataSource
	}
}

fun main() {
	val ctx = AnnotationConfigApplicationContext(SystemTestConfig::class.java)
	// everything wires up across configuration classes...
	val transferService = ctx.getBean<TransferService>()
	transferService.transfer(100.00, "A123", "C456")
}
Constructor injection in @Configuration classes is only supported as of Spring Framework 4.3. Note also that there is no need to specify @Autowired if the target bean defines only one constructor.

Fully-qualifying imported beans for ease of navigation

In the preceding scenario, using @Autowired works well and provides the desired modularity, but determining exactly where the autowired bean definitions are declared is still somewhat ambiguous. For example, as a developer looking at ServiceConfig, how do you know exactly where the @Autowired AccountRepository bean is declared? It is not explicit in the code, and this may be just fine. Remember that the Spring Tools for Eclipse provides tooling that can render graphs showing how everything is wired, which may be all you need. Also, your Java IDE can easily find all declarations and uses of the AccountRepository type and quickly show you the location of @Bean methods that return that type.

In cases where this ambiguity is not acceptable and you wish to have direct navigation from within your IDE from one @Configuration class to another, consider autowiring the configuration classes themselves. The following example shows how to do so:

  • Java

  • Kotlin

@Configuration
public class ServiceConfig {

	@Autowired
	private RepositoryConfig repositoryConfig;

	@Bean
	public TransferService transferService() {
		// navigate 'through' the config class to the @Bean method!
		return new TransferServiceImpl(repositoryConfig.accountRepository());
	}
}
@Configuration
class ServiceConfig {

	@Autowired
	private lateinit var repositoryConfig: RepositoryConfig

	@Bean
	fun transferService(): TransferService {
		// navigate 'through' the config class to the @Bean method!
		return TransferServiceImpl(repositoryConfig.accountRepository())
	}
}

In the preceding situation, where AccountRepository is defined is completely explicit. However, ServiceConfig is now tightly coupled to RepositoryConfig. That is the tradeoff. This tight coupling can be somewhat mitigated by using interface-based or abstract class-based @Configuration classes. Consider the following example:

  • Java

  • Kotlin

@Configuration
public class ServiceConfig {

	@Autowired
	private RepositoryConfig repositoryConfig;

	@Bean
	public TransferService transferService() {
		return new TransferServiceImpl(repositoryConfig.accountRepository());
	}
}

@Configuration
public interface RepositoryConfig {

	@Bean
	AccountRepository accountRepository();
}

@Configuration
public class DefaultRepositoryConfig implements RepositoryConfig {

	@Bean
	public AccountRepository accountRepository() {
		return new JdbcAccountRepository(...);
	}
}

@Configuration
@Import({ServiceConfig.class, DefaultRepositoryConfig.class})  // import the concrete config!
public class SystemTestConfig {

	@Bean
	public DataSource dataSource() {
		// return DataSource
	}

}

public static void main(String[] args) {
	ApplicationContext ctx = new AnnotationConfigApplicationContext(SystemTestConfig.class);
	TransferService transferService = ctx.getBean(TransferService.class);
	transferService.transfer(100.00, "A123", "C456");
}
import org.springframework.beans.factory.getBean

@Configuration
class ServiceConfig {

	@Autowired
	private lateinit var repositoryConfig: RepositoryConfig

	@Bean
	fun transferService(): TransferService {
		return TransferServiceImpl(repositoryConfig.accountRepository())
	}
}

@Configuration
interface RepositoryConfig {

	@Bean
	fun accountRepository(): AccountRepository
}

@Configuration
class DefaultRepositoryConfig : RepositoryConfig {

	@Bean
	fun accountRepository(): AccountRepository {
		return JdbcAccountRepository(...)
	}
}

@Configuration
@Import(ServiceConfig::class, DefaultRepositoryConfig::class)  // import the concrete config!
class SystemTestConfig {

	@Bean
	fun dataSource(): DataSource {
		// return DataSource
	}

}

fun main() {
	val ctx = AnnotationConfigApplicationContext(SystemTestConfig::class.java)
	val transferService = ctx.getBean<TransferService>()
	transferService.transfer(100.00, "A123", "C456")
}

Now ServiceConfig is loosely coupled with respect to the concrete DefaultRepositoryConfig, and built-in IDE tooling is still useful: You can easily get a type hierarchy of RepositoryConfig implementations. In this way, navigating @Configuration classes and their dependencies becomes no different than the usual process of navigating interface-based code.

If you want to influence the startup creation order of certain beans, consider declaring some of them as @Lazy (for creation on first access instead of on startup) or as @DependsOn certain other beans (making sure that specific other beans are created before the current bean, beyond what the latter’s direct dependencies imply).

Conditionally Include @Configuration Classes or @Bean Methods

It is often useful to conditionally enable or disable a complete @Configuration class or even individual @Bean methods, based on some arbitrary system state. One common example of this is to use the @Profile annotation to activate beans only when a specific profile has been enabled in the Spring Environment (see Bean Definition Profiles for details).

The @Profile annotation is actually implemented by using a much more flexible annotation called @Conditional. The @Conditional annotation indicates specific org.springframework.context.annotation.Condition implementations that should be consulted before a @Bean is registered.

Implementations of the Condition interface provide a matches(…​) method that returns true or false. For example, the following listing shows the actual Condition implementation used for @Profile:

  • Java

  • Kotlin

@Override
public boolean matches(ConditionContext context, AnnotatedTypeMetadata metadata) {
	// Read the @Profile annotation attributes
	MultiValueMap<String, Object> attrs = metadata.getAllAnnotationAttributes(Profile.class.getName());
	if (attrs != null) {
		for (Object value : attrs.get("value")) {
			if (context.getEnvironment().matchesProfiles((String[]) value)) {
				return true;
			}
		}
		return false;
	}
	return true;
}
override fun matches(context: ConditionContext, metadata: AnnotatedTypeMetadata): Boolean {
	// Read the @Profile annotation attributes
	val attrs = metadata.getAllAnnotationAttributes(Profile::class.java.name)
	if (attrs != null) {
		for (value in attrs["value"]!!) {
			if (context.environment.matchesProfiles(*value as Array<String>)) {
				return true
			}
		}
		return false
	}
	return true
}

See the @Conditional javadoc for more detail.

Combining Java and XML Configuration

Spring’s @Configuration class support does not aim to be a 100% complete replacement for Spring XML. Some facilities, such as Spring XML namespaces, remain an ideal way to configure the container. In cases where XML is convenient or necessary, you have a choice: either instantiate the container in an “XML-centric” way by using, for example, ClassPathXmlApplicationContext, or instantiate it in a “Java-centric” way by using AnnotationConfigApplicationContext and the @ImportResource annotation to import XML as needed.

XML-centric Use of @Configuration Classes

It may be preferable to bootstrap the Spring container from XML and include @Configuration classes in an ad-hoc fashion. For example, in a large existing codebase that uses Spring XML, it is easier to create @Configuration classes on an as-needed basis and include them from the existing XML files. Later in this section, we cover the options for using @Configuration classes in this kind of “XML-centric” situation.

Declaring @Configuration classes as plain Spring <bean/> elements

Remember that @Configuration classes are ultimately bean definitions in the container. In this series of examples, we create a @Configuration class named AppConfig and include it within system-test-config.xml as a <bean/> definition. Because <context:annotation-config/> is switched on, the container recognizes the @Configuration annotation and processes the @Bean methods declared in AppConfig properly.

The following example shows the AppConfig configuration class in Java and Kotlin:

  • Java

  • Kotlin

@Configuration
public class AppConfig {

	@Autowired
	private DataSource dataSource;

	@Bean
	public AccountRepository accountRepository() {
		return new JdbcAccountRepository(dataSource);
	}

	@Bean
	public TransferService transferService() {
		return new TransferServiceImpl(accountRepository());
	}
}
@Configuration
class AppConfig {

	@Autowired
	private lateinit var dataSource: DataSource

	@Bean
	fun accountRepository(): AccountRepository {
		return JdbcAccountRepository(dataSource)
	}

	@Bean
	fun transferService() = TransferService(accountRepository())
}

The following example shows part of a sample system-test-config.xml file:

<beans>
	<!-- enable processing of annotations such as @Autowired and @Configuration -->
	<context:annotation-config/>

	<context:property-placeholder location="classpath:/com/acme/jdbc.properties"/>

	<bean class="com.acme.AppConfig"/>

	<bean class="org.springframework.jdbc.datasource.DriverManagerDataSource">
		<property name="url" value="${jdbc.url}"/>
		<property name="username" value="${jdbc.username}"/>
		<property name="password" value="${jdbc.password}"/>
	</bean>
</beans>

The following example shows a possible jdbc.properties file:

jdbc.url=jdbc:hsqldb:hsql://localhost/xdb
jdbc.username=sa
jdbc.password=

  • Java

  • Kotlin

public static void main(String[] args) {
	ApplicationContext ctx = new ClassPathXmlApplicationContext("classpath:/com/acme/system-test-config.xml");
	TransferService transferService = ctx.getBean(TransferService.class);
	// ...
}
fun main() {
	val ctx = ClassPathXmlApplicationContext("classpath:/com/acme/system-test-config.xml")
	val transferService = ctx.getBean<TransferService>()
	// ...
}
In the system-test-config.xml file, the AppConfig <bean/> does not declare an id attribute. While it would be acceptable to do so, it is unnecessary, given that no other bean ever refers to it, and it is unlikely to be explicitly fetched from the container by name. Similarly, the DataSource bean is only ever autowired by type, so an explicit bean id is not strictly required.

Using <context:component-scan/> to pick up @Configuration classes

Because @Configuration is meta-annotated with @Component, @Configuration-annotated classes are automatically candidates for component scanning. Using the same scenario as described in the previous example, we can redefine system-test-config.xml to take advantage of component-scanning. Note that, in this case, we need not explicitly declare <context:annotation-config/>, because <context:component-scan/> enables the same functionality.

The following example shows the modified system-test-config.xml file:

<beans>
	<!-- picks up and registers AppConfig as a bean definition -->
	<context:component-scan base-package="com.acme"/>

	<context:property-placeholder location="classpath:/com/acme/jdbc.properties"/>

	<bean class="org.springframework.jdbc.datasource.DriverManagerDataSource">
		<property name="url" value="${jdbc.url}"/>
		<property name="username" value="${jdbc.username}"/>
		<property name="password" value="${jdbc.password}"/>
	</bean>
</beans>

@Configuration Class-centric Use of XML with @ImportResource

In applications where @Configuration classes are the primary mechanism for configuring the container, it may still be necessary to use at least some XML. In such scenarios, you can use @ImportResource and define only as much XML as you need. Doing so achieves a “Java-centric” approach to configuring the container and keeps XML to a bare minimum. The following example (which includes a configuration class, an XML file that defines a bean, a properties file, and the main() method) shows how to use the @ImportResource annotation to achieve “Java-centric” configuration that uses XML as needed:

  • Java

  • Kotlin

@Configuration
@ImportResource("classpath:/com/acme/properties-config.xml")
public class AppConfig {

	@Value("${jdbc.url}")
	private String url;

	@Value("${jdbc.username}")
	private String username;

	@Value("${jdbc.password}")
	private String password;

	@Bean
	public DataSource dataSource() {
		return new DriverManagerDataSource(url, username, password);
	}

	@Bean
	public AccountRepository accountRepository(DataSource dataSource) {
		return new JdbcAccountRepository(dataSource);
	}

	@Bean
	public TransferService transferService(AccountRepository accountRepository) {
		return new TransferServiceImpl(accountRepository);
	}

}
@Configuration
@ImportResource("classpath:/com/acme/properties-config.xml")
class AppConfig {

	@Value("\${jdbc.url}")
	private lateinit var url: String

	@Value("\${jdbc.username}")
	private lateinit var username: String

	@Value("\${jdbc.password}")
	private lateinit var password: String

	@Bean
	fun dataSource(): DataSource {
		return DriverManagerDataSource(url, username, password)
	}

	@Bean
	fun accountRepository(dataSource: DataSource): AccountRepository {
		return JdbcAccountRepository(dataSource)
	}

	@Bean
	fun transferService(accountRepository: AccountRepository): TransferService {
		return TransferServiceImpl(accountRepository)
	}

}
properties-config.xml
<beans>
	<context:property-placeholder location="classpath:/com/acme/jdbc.properties"/>
</beans>
jdbc.properties
jdbc.url=jdbc:hsqldb:hsql://localhost/xdb
jdbc.username=sa
jdbc.password=

  • Java

  • Kotlin

public static void main(String[] args) {
	ApplicationContext ctx = new AnnotationConfigApplicationContext(AppConfig.class);
	TransferService transferService = ctx.getBean(TransferService.class);
	// ...
}
import org.springframework.beans.factory.getBean

fun main() {
	val ctx = AnnotationConfigApplicationContext(AppConfig::class.java)
	val transferService = ctx.getBean<TransferService>()
	// ...
}