What's the difference between @Component, @Repository & @Service annotations in Spring?

Question

Can @Component, @Repository and @Service annotations be used interchangeably in Spring or do they provide any particular functionality besides acting as a notation device?

Answer 1

@Component is the top level generic annotation which makes the annotated bean to be scanned and available in the DI container

@Repository is specialized annotation and it brings the feature of converting all the unchecked exceptions from the DAO classes

@Service is specialized annotation. it do not bring any new feature as of now but it clarifies the intent of the bean

@Controller is specialized annotation which makes the bean MVC aware and allows the use of further annotation like @RequestMapping and all such

Here are more details