MVC Java Config - HandlerInterceptor not excluding paths

Question

I have a MVC Java configuration but the HandlerInterceptor is not excluding some patterns.

At the line marked with xxx, if

1) I add both addPatterns("/**") and excludePathPatterns("*.ecxld") to the HandlerInterceptor's InterceptorRegistration, the HandlerInterceptor.preHanlde() is NOT invoked at all. e.g .addPathPatterns("/**").excludePathPatterns("*.ecxld")

2) I add only excludePathPatterns("*.ecxld") to the HandlerInterceptor's InterceptorRegistration, the HandlerInterceptor.preHanlde() is still executed.

(the other interceptors are invoked fine).

Any pointers appreciated.

Thanks

@Configuration
public class MyMVCConfigurerAdapter extends WebMvcConfigurerAdapter {

 @Override
 public void addInterceptors(final InterceptorRegistry registry) {

     registry.addInterceptor(getInterceptorOne());

     registry.addInterceptor(getMyHandlerInterceptor())
                 .excludePathPatterns("*.ecxld");  // **xxx**

     registry.addInterceptor(getInterceptorTwo()
     );

 }

Answer 1

The patterns you specify for include and exclude are ant bases path expressions and not normal URL expressions as you would express in web.xml to map a servlet or filter for instance.

To make an exclude work you have to also include an include path (as you already noticed with your second remark). Next change your exclude pattern to /**/*.ecxld.

Your current expression *.ecxld would match file.ecxld but it will not match /file.ecxld or even /foo/file.ecxld. The /**/ part takes care of that. However to make it work it also requires an includePathExpression (the code checks if there is an includePathExpression when not it is ignoring the excludePathExpression).

So in short change your configuration to the following should solve your problem.

@Configuration
public class MyMVCConfigurerAdapter extends WebMvcConfigurerAdapter {

 @Override
 public void addInterceptors(final InterceptorRegistry registry) {

     registry.addInterceptor(getInterceptorOne());

     registry.addInterceptor(getMyHandlerInterceptor())
                 .includePathPatterns("/**")
                 .excludePathPatterns("/**/*.ecxld");  

     registry.addInterceptor(getInterceptorTwo()
     );

 }

Answer 2

I know this was a long while ago but I just stumbled over the same problem. During my search I found the following blog. There it is mentioned that if the interceptors are configured as beans they will be automatically added to the chain. I am now using Spring 4.1.x so there might be a difference but what solved it for me was the following:

1. (I tried to avoid defining them as a spring beans. It didn't help.)
2. I configured the interceptors as spring beans (so I could autowire stuff into them see here)

3. I changed my definition as follows:

   registry.addInterceptor(getMyHandlerInterceptor()) .addPathPatterns("/**") .excludePathPatterns("/user/login");

By putting the addPathPatterns before the excludePathPatterns the behavior of the interceptor suddenly worked fine.