Is there a programmatic way to find out how a Spring bean was created?

Question

Is there a programmatic way to find out which Configuration class or xml file created a Spring bean? Instead of digging through the code to figure it out.

Answer 1

The following demonstrates how to obtain the source of the configuration using the bean name.

1. Obtain the bean definition for the bean: ctx.getBeanDefinition("beanName")
2. Invoke getResourceDescription().

Below is a working example which sets up a @Configuration based bean called 'a' defined in AppConfig, and an XML bean named "xmlBean" defined in SpringBeans.xml. In each case, the source @Configuration class, or xml file is displayed correctly.

Here is the java config class which sets up bean=a, and also loads XML config file SpringBeans.xml containing bean=xmlBean.

@Configuration
@ImportResource({"classpath:SpringBeans.xml"})
@ComponentScan(basePackages = "com.test.config")
public class AppConfig {

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

}

Here is the bean defined in SpringBeans.xml:

<bean id="xmlBean" class="com.test.HelloWorld">
    <property name="name" value="XML" />
</bean>

Here is simple code which uses getResourceDescription():

    AnnotationConfigApplicationContext ctx = new AnnotationConfigApplicationContext();

    ctx.register(AppConfig.class);
    ctx.refresh();

    BeanDefinition javaConfigBeanDefinition = ctx.getBeanDefinition("a");
    System.out.println("Creation class for a=" + javaConfigBeanDefinition.getResourceDescription());

    BeanDefinition xmlBeanDefinition = ctx.getBeanDefinition("xmlBean");
    System.out.println("Creation XML file for xmlBean=" + xmlBeanDefinition.getResourceDescription());

Output:

Creation class for a=com.test.config.AppConfig
Creation XML file for xmlBean=class path resource [SpringBeans.xml]

Probably a more practical way is to create a BeanDefinitionRegistryPostProcessor and request the information there:

@Component
public class FindBeanConfigLocation implements BeanDefinitionRegistryPostProcessor {

    @Override
    public void postProcessBeanFactory(ConfigurableListableBeanFactory arg0) throws BeansException {
    }

    @Override
    public void postProcessBeanDefinitionRegistry(BeanDefinitionRegistry registry) throws BeansException {
        BeanDefinition javaConfigBeanDefinition = registry.getBeanDefinition("a");
        System.out.println("Creation class for a=" + javaConfigBeanDefinition.getResourceDescription());

        BeanDefinition xmlBeanDefinition = registry.getBeanDefinition("xmlBean");
        System.out.println("Creation XML file for xmlBean=" + xmlBeanDefinition.getResourceDescription());
    }

}