How to handle static content in Spring MVC?

Question

I am developing a webapp using Spring MVC 3 and have the DispatcherServlet catching all requests to \'/\' like so (web.xml):

Answer 1

The URLRewrite is sort of a "hack" if you want to call it that. What it comes down to is, you're re-inventing the wheel; as there are already existing solutions. Another thing to remember is Http Server = Static content & App server = dynamic content (this is how they were designed). By delegating the appropriate responsibilities to each server you maximize efficiency... but now-a-days this is probably only a concern in a performance critical environments and something like Tomcat would most likely work well in both roles most of the time; but it is still something to keep in mind none the less.

Answer 2

For java based spring configuration you can use the following

Using ResourceHandlerRegistry which stores registrations of resource handlers for serving static resources.

More Info @ WebMvcConfigurerAdapter which defines callback methods to customize the Java-based configuration for Spring MVC enabled via @EnableWebMvc.

@EnableWebMvc
@Configurable
@ComponentScan("package.to.scan")
public class WebConfigurer extends WebMvcConfigurerAdapter {

    @Override
    public void addResourceHandlers(ResourceHandlerRegistry registry) {
        registry.addResourceHandler("/static_resource_path/*.jpg").addResourceLocations("server_destination_path");

    }

Answer 3

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<beans xmlns="http://www.springframework.org/schema/beans"
    xmlns:mvc="http://www.springframework.org/schema/mvc"
    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/mvc
        http://www.springframework.org/schema/mvc/spring-mvc-3.0.xsd">
<mvc:default-servlet-handler/>
</beans>

and if you want to use annotation based configuration use below code

@Override
    public void configureDefaultServletHandling(DefaultServletHandlerConfigurer configurer) {
        configurer.enable();
    }

Answer 4

I found a way around it using tuckey's urlrewritefilter. Please feel free to give a better answer if you have one!

In web.xml:

<filter>
    <filter-name>UrlRewriteFilter</filter-name>
    <filter-class>org.tuckey.web.filters.urlrewrite.UrlRewriteFilter</filter-class>
</filter>

<filter-mapping>
    <filter-name>UrlRewriteFilter</filter-name>
    <url-pattern>/*</url-pattern>
</filter-mapping>

  <servlet>
    <servlet-name>app</servlet-name>
    <servlet-class>org.springframework.web.servlet.DispatcherServlet</servlet-class>
  </servlet>

  <servlet-mapping>
    <servlet-name>app</servlet-name>
    <url-pattern>/app/*</url-pattern>
  </servlet-mapping>

In urlrewrite.xml:

<urlrewrite default-match-type="wildcard">
<rule>
    <from>/</from>
    <to>/app/</to>
</rule>
<rule match-type="regex">
    <from>^([^\.]+)$</from>
    <to>/app/$1</to>
</rule>
<outbound-rule>
    <from>/app/**</from>
    <to>/$1</to>
</outbound-rule>    

This means that any uri with a '.' in it (like style.css for example) won't be re-written.

Answer 5

I solved it this way:

<servlet-mapping>
    <servlet-name>Spring MVC Dispatcher Servlet</servlet-name>
    <url-pattern>/</url-pattern>
</servlet-mapping>
<servlet-mapping>
    <servlet-name>default</servlet-name>
    <url-pattern>*.jpg</url-pattern>
</servlet-mapping>
<servlet-mapping>
    <servlet-name>default</servlet-name>
    <url-pattern>*.png</url-pattern>
</servlet-mapping>
<servlet-mapping>
    <servlet-name>default</servlet-name>
    <url-pattern>*.gif</url-pattern>
</servlet-mapping>
<servlet-mapping>
    <servlet-name>default</servlet-name>
    <url-pattern>*.js</url-pattern>
</servlet-mapping>
<servlet-mapping>
    <servlet-name>default</servlet-name>
    <url-pattern>*.css</url-pattern>
</servlet-mapping>

This works on Tomcat and ofcourse Jboss. However in the end I decided to use the solution Spring provides (as mentioned by rozky) which is far more portable.

Answer 6

My way of solving this problem is placing all your actions with a specific prefix like "web" or "service" and configure that all url's with that prefix will be intercepted by the DispatcherServlet.