How to use default-servlet-handler

Question

I want to configure Spring MVC to serve dynamic files mixed with static files, like this (URL => File):

/iAmDynamic.html   => /WEB-INF/views/iAmDynamic.html.ftl
/iAmAlsoDynamic.js => /WEB-INF/views/iAmAlsoDynamic.js.ftl
/iAmStatiHtml      => /iAmStatic.html

The DispatchServlet is mapped to /, annotation-based MVC configuration is enabled and I have a view controller like this (Simplified):

@Controller
public class ViewController
{
    @RequestMapping("*.html")
    public String handleHtml(final HttpServletRequest request)
    {
         return request.getServletPath();
    }

    @RequestMapping("*.js")
    public String handleJavaScript(final HttpServletRequest request)
    {
        return request.getServletPath();
    }
}

The spring config looks like this:

<context:component-scan base-package="myPackage" />

<mvc:default-servlet-handler />

<bean id="freemarkerConfig" class="org.springframework.web.servlet.view.freemarker.FreeMarkerConfigurer">
  <property name="templateLoaderPath" value="/WEB-INF/views/" />
</bean>

<bean id="viewResolver"
    class="org.springframework.web.servlet.view.freemarker.FreeMarkerViewResolver">
  <property name="cache" value="true" />
  <property name="prefix" value="" />
  <property name="suffix" value=".ftl" />
</bean>

Unfortunately it doesn't work. When this <mvc:default-servlet-handler /> is active then I can only access the iAmStatic.html file. When I disable the default-servlet-handler then only the dynamic stuff works. But I want both at once and that's exactly what this default-servlet-handler should do, or not? Where is the error here?

Answer 1

I had similar problem, none of the requests were getting mapped to the Spring Controllers: I discovered I was missing this in spring config xml:

<mvc:annotation-driven/>

It seems with , this is necessary. From documentation, the purpose of doing this is:

Configures the annotation-driven Spring MVC Controller programming model

I will also let DefaultServlet handle static content requests.

So your spring config should look like:

<context:component-scan base-package="myPackage" />
<!-- Define location and mapping of static content -->
<mvc:resources location="/static/" mapping="/static/**"/>

<mvc:default-servlet-handler />
<mvc:annotation-driven/>
<bean id="freemarkerConfig" class="org.springframework.web.servlet.view.freemarker.FreeMarkerConfigurer">
  <property name="templateLoaderPath" value="/WEB-INF/views/" />
</bean>

<bean id="viewResolver"
    class="org.springframework.web.servlet.view.freemarker.FreeMarkerViewResolver">
  <property name="cache" value="true" />
  <property name="prefix" value="" />
  <property name="suffix" value=".ftl" />
</bean>

Hope this helps!