What is Spring Boot

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Last updated on March 9th, 2024

In this topic, we will learn about Spring Boot, the Key features of Spring Boot and Create a Spring Boot Project.

Table of content:

1. What is Spring Boot?
2. Why Spring Boot?
3. Why not Spring MVC can be used?
4. What are the features of Spring Boot?
5. How to Start a new Spring Boot project?
6. Conclusion

1. What is Spring Boot?

Spring Boot is just an extension of the already existing and extensive Spring Framework, but it has some specific features that make the application easier for working within the developer ecosystem.
Spring Boot provides a solution for building a Spring Application that is simple and easy. Because there is no need for Tons of configuration to build an application in the Spring framework.

2. Why Spring Boot?

  • Spring Boot is equal to (Spring Framework-XML Configuration)+Integrated Server.
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  • We can develop rapid applications with the help of Spring Boot with the use of the regular Spring Code       
  • In Spring Boot applications there is no confusion about the configuration because Spring Boot uses Java Code for the configuration and also some common things are auto-configurable and provided for the developer. That’s why there is no time taking process for the configuration of the application in the Spring Boot
  • Spring Boot reduces boilerplate code
  • The goal of the Spring is too concise the length of the code and easily develop web and client applications 
  • Spring Boot has mostly been used in REST API-based applications
  • Spring Boot is the most trending and popular Java for Developers recently
  • Spring Boot is a technique that helps to develop Spring applications easily and quickly for the production level with less period

3. Why not Spring MVC can be used?

Spring MVC is used to build web applications. This follows the Model-View-Controller design pattern. This implements all the basic features of a core spring framework like Inversion of Control and Dependency Injection.
When Java Developers are using Spring MVC for application development, they focus only on the business logic of that application because common things are given by this Spring Framework. But Spring MVC involves writing with lots of boilerplate code. When the developer is setting the setup environment and configuration of the application struggling a lot. The configuration of the Spring MVC Application is taking a lot of time that’s delaying the application development time. So that developing a Spring MVC application is hard such as:

  • How do I set up  Spring MVC Project Configuration (XML config-based, Java config-based or Annotation config based)?
  • How do I install the server? (Tomcat, JBoss, etc…)

4. What are the features of Spring Boot?

  • It Makes it easier to get started on a new Spring Boot project.
  • It shrinks the amount of manual Configuration.
  • It performs auto-configuration based on Properties Files and JAR classpath.
  • It helps to resolve dependency conflicts(Maven Project or Gradle Project).
  • It is provided with an embedded HTTP server so you can get started quickly Embed Tomcat, Jetty, or Undertow directly (no requirement to deploy WAR files)
  • No code generation and no requirement for XML configuration all configuration can be done with Java code.

Now I have a question for you.?

Q: Does Spring Boot replace Spring MVC, Spring REST, etc…?
Ans.: No, Instead Spring Boot uses those technologies(Spring MVC, Spring REST, etc..)

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Once you do Spring Boot configs then you make use of regular Spring coding.
@Controller,@Component,@Autowired, etc…

Q: Does Spring Boot run code faster than regular Spring code?
Ans.: No, Behind the scenes, Spring Boot uses the same code as the Spring Framework.

5. How to Start a new Spring Boot project?

Create a Spring Boot project:

  • You can create Project from Spring Initializer to create an initial setup. You can go to the Spring Initializr to create a Spring Boot Project or you can also start with STS IDE or Eclipse to choose all the Spring Starters.
  • You need to choose a project tool for the Maven project or Gradle project as the build tool.
  • You need to choose a language: Java, Kotlin or Groovy.
  • Select the current version of spring boot 3.0.0. It has changed from time to time. Just chose the latest release (but not the snapshot)
  • Project Metadata
  • Group: It uniquely identifies your project across all projects.
  •  Artifact: It is the name of the jar without the version.
  • Name: The name is used for the project used by the maven to build the artifact.
  • Description: A detailed description of the project.
  • Package name: The package is to configure the root java package that contains all the generated source codes.
  • Add required dependencies of the project
  • The setup is ready to use Hit the “Generate” button to download the zip and unzip it into a folder on your computer. Then import a unzip folder project into the IDE 

6. Conclusion

We learned all about the spring boot, Why not Spring MVC can be used? What are the features of Spring Boot? How to use Spring Boot?

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