Educational Article

What is Spring Boot? Spring Boot is a project that is built on the top of the Spring Framework. Its primary goal is to simplify the setup and develo...

whatspringboot?

What is Spring Boot?


Spring Boot is a project that is built on the top of the Spring Framework. Its primary goal is to simplify the setup and development of Spring applications. With Spring Boot, it becomes significantly easier to create stand-alone, production-grade applications that you can run.


What Makes Spring Boot Special?


There are several characteristics that make Spring Boot a popular choice amongst developers:


  • Auto-configuration: Spring Boot offers automatic configuration, meaning that it automatically configures your Spring application based on the dependencies you have added in the project.
  • Stand-alone: Spring Boot creates stand-alone Spring applications that can be started using `java -jar`.
  • Opinionated: Spring Boot has an opinionated view of the Spring platform and third-party libraries, allowing you to get started quickly without needing to make a lot of decisions about configurations.

  • Key Features of Spring Boot


    Spring Boot has a lot of features that are designed to simplify the life of a developer. Here are some of the key features:


  • Spring Application: It creates spring application.
  • SpringApplicationEvents and Listeners: It provides events and listeners for spring applications.
  • Admin Features: It provides admin features.
  • Externalized Configuration: It provides externalized configuration to work with the same application code in different environments.

  • Understanding the Spring Boot Startup Process


    When you run a Spring Boot application, a series of actions take place:


    1. The Spring Boot Loader steps in: The loader launches the actual application.

    2. It then starts the SpringApplication: The SpringApplication class is a main entry point for a Spring application. The class has a static run method that takes two arguments: a source that is the class containing the main method, and command line arguments.

    3. Next, an ApplicationContext is created: The ApplicationContext is a central interface in Spring applications. It provides configuration for an application.

    4. Beans are then loaded: The ApplicationContext is responsible for loading, configuring, and assembling the beans. These beans are created with the configuration metadata that you supply to the application.

    5. Finally, the ApplicationRunner or CommandLineRunner classes run: If these classes are present, they run just before SpringApplication completes.


    Why Use Spring Boot?


    Spring Boot is used to create stand-alone Spring applications that can be started using java -jar. It simplifies the bootstrapping and development of a new Spring application. The developers just need to understand the basic flow and they can start developing Spring applications.


    Spring Boot takes care of all the dependencies and allows developers to focus more on the business requirements rather than the project setup and other configurations. With just a few lines of code, you can have a fully functioning application ready.


    In Conclusion


    Spring Boot is a powerful tool that simplifies the development of Spring applications. It takes an opinionated view of the Spring platform as well as third-party libraries, so developers can get started with minimum fuss. With

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