Spring MVC - Multi Action Controller Example

The following example shows how to use the 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.

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;

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

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

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

<bean class = "org.springframework.web.servlet.handler.BeanNameUrlHandlerMapping"/>
<bean name = "/home.htm" class = "com.tutorialspoint.UserController" /> 
<bean name = "/user/*.htm" class = "com.tutorialspoint.UserController" /> 

For example, using the above configuration, if URI −

/home.htm is requested, DispatcherServlet will forward the request to the UserController home() method.

user/add.htm is requested, DispatcherServlet will forward the request to the UserController add() method.

user/remove.htm is requested, DispatcherServlet will forward the request to the UserController remove() method.

To begin with, let us have a working Ecppse IDE in place and stick to the following steps to develop a Dynamic Form based Web Apppcation using the 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;

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

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

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

TestWeb-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">

   <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.handler.BeanNameUrlHandlerMapping"/>
   <bean name = "/home.htm" 
      class = "com.tutorialspoint.UserController" /> 
   <bean name = "/user/*.htm" 
      class = "com.tutorialspoint.UserController" />    
</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>

Once you are done with creating source and configuration files, export your apppcation. Right cpck on your apppcation, use Export → WAR File option and save the TestWeb.war file in Tomcat s webapps folder.

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

Try a URL http://localhost:8080/TestWeb/user/add.htm and we will see the following screen, if everything is fine with the Spring Web Apppcation.