Spring MVC - Parameter Method Name Resolver Example

The following example shows how to use the Parameter Method Name Resolver of a Multi Action Controller using the Spring Web MVC framework. The MultiActionController class helps to map multiple URLs with their methods in a single controller respectively.

Note* − MultiActionController is not available from Spring 5.1 onwards. This example is written using earlier version of spring.

package com.tutorialspoint;

import javax.servlet.http.HttpServletRequest;
import javax.servlet.http.HttpServletResponse;

import org.springframework.web.servlet.ModelAndView;
import org.springframework.web.servlet.mvc.multiaction.MultiActionController;

public class UserController extends MultiActionController{
	
   public ModelAndView home(HttpServletRequest request,
      HttpServletResponse response) throws Exception {
      ModelAndView model = new ModelAndView("user");
      model.addObject("message", "Home");
      return model;
   }

   public ModelAndView add(HttpServletRequest request,
      HttpServletResponse response) throws Exception {
      ModelAndView model = new ModelAndView("user");
      model.addObject("message", "Add");
      return model;
   }

   public ModelAndView remove(HttpServletRequest request,
      HttpServletResponse response) throws Exception {
      ModelAndView model = new ModelAndView("user");
      model.addObject("message", "Remove");
      return model;
   }
}

<bean class = "com.tutorialspoint.UserController">
   <property name = "methodNameResolver">
      <bean class = "org.springframework.web.servlet.mvc.multiaction.ParameterMethodNameResolver">
         <property name = "paramName" value = "action"/>
      </bean>
   </property>
</bean>

For example, using the above configuration, if URI −

• /user/*.htm?action=home is requested, DispatcherServlet will forward the request to the UserController home() method.

• /user/*.htm?action=add is requested, DispatcherServlet will forward the request to the UserController add() method.

• /user/*.htm?action=remove is requested, DispatcherServlet will forward the request to the UserController remove() method.

To start with, let us have a working Eclipse IDE in place and consider the following steps to develop a Dynamic Form based Web Application using Spring Web Framework −

UserController.java

package com.tutorialspoint;

import javax.servlet.http.HttpServletRequest;
import javax.servlet.http.HttpServletResponse;

import org.springframework.web.servlet.ModelAndView;
import org.springframework.web.servlet.mvc.multiaction.MultiActionController;

public class UserController extends MultiActionController{
	
   public ModelAndView home(HttpServletRequest request,
      HttpServletResponse response) throws Exception {
      ModelAndView model = new ModelAndView("user");
      model.addObject("message", "Home");
      return model;
   }

   public ModelAndView add(HttpServletRequest request,
      HttpServletResponse response) throws Exception {
      ModelAndView model = new ModelAndView("user");
      model.addObject("message", "Add");
      return model;
   }

   public ModelAndView remove(HttpServletRequest request,
      HttpServletResponse response) throws Exception {
      ModelAndView model = new ModelAndView("user");
      model.addObject("message", "Remove");
      return model;
   }
}

hello-servlet.xml

<beans xmlns = "http://www.springframework.org/schema/beans"
   xmlns:context = "http://www.springframework.org/schema/context"
   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/context 
   http://www.springframework.org/schema/context/spring-context-3.0.xsd">

   <context:component-scan base-package = "com.tutorialspoint" />

   <bean class = "org.springframework.web.servlet.view.InternalResourceViewResolver">
      <property name = "prefix" value = "/WEB-INF/jsp/" />
      <property name = "suffix" value = ".jsp" />
   </bean>
 
   <bean class = "org.springframework.web.servlet.mvc.support.ControllerClassNameHandlerMapping"> 
      <property name = "caseSensitive" value = "true" />
   </bean>
   <bean class = "com.tutorialspoint.UserController">
      <property name = "methodNameResolver">
         <bean class = "org.springframework.web.servlet.mvc.multiaction.ParameterMethodNameResolver">
            <property name = "paramName" value = "action"/>
         </bean>
      </property>
   </bean>
</beans>

home.jsp

<%@ page contentType = "text/html; charset = UTF-8" %>
<html>
   <head>
      <meta http-equiv = "Content-Type" content = "text/html; charset = ISO-8859-1">
      <title>Home</title>
   </head>
   
   <body>
      <a href = "user/add.htm" >Add</a> <br>
      <a href = "user/remove.htm" >Remove</a>
   </body>
</html>

user.jsp

<%@ page contentType = "text/html; charset = UTF-8" %>
<html>
   <head>
      <title>Hello World</title>
   </head>
   <body>
      <h2>${message}</h2>  
   </body>
</html>

Output

Once you are done with creating source and configuration files, export your application. Right click on your application, use Run As → Maven Install option and save your hello.war file in Tomcat's webapps folder.

Now, start your Tomcat server and make sure you are able to access other webpages from the webapps folder using a standard browser. Now, try a URL − http://localhost:8080/hello/user/test.htm?action=home and we will see the following screen, if everything is fine with the Spring Web Application.