Quick Spring Mobile 1.0 Tutorial

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  • Post category:Java / Mobile

This is a quick tutorial on Spring Mobile 1.0. You will need Eclipse with m2e to follow the steps below.

1. In Eclipse, create a new Maven Project using the spring-mvc-jpa-archetype.

New Maven Project

New Maven Project

2. Add the spring-mobile-device dependency to pom.xml.

	<dependency>
		<groupId>org.springframework.mobile</groupId>
		<artifactId>spring-mobile-device</artifactId>
		<version>1.0.0.RELEASE</version>
	</dependency>

Maven Add Dependency

Also add the java servlet API, which we will be used to import HttpServletRequest in the unit test later.

	<dependency>
		<groupId>javax.servlet</groupId>
		<artifactId>servlet-api</artifactId>
		<version>2.5</version>
		<scope>provided</scope>
	</dependency>

Spring Mobile needs Spring MVC 3.1, so change

	<spring.version>3.0.5.RELEASE</spring.version>

to

	<spring.version>3.1.1.RELEASE</spring.version>

3. Add the following Spring Mobile interceptors in servlet-context.xml.

	<interceptors>
		<!-- Resolve the device that originated the web request -->
		<beans:bean class="org.springframework.mobile.device.DeviceResolverHandlerInterceptor" />

		<!-- Manage the user's site preference -->
		<beans:bean class="org.springframework.mobile.device.site.SitePreferenceHandlerInterceptor" />

		<!-- Redirects mobile users to domain.com/quickspringmobile/spring/m/ -->
		<beans:bean class="org.springframework.mobile.device.switcher.SiteSwitcherHandlerInterceptor" factory-method="urlPath">
			<beans:constructor-arg value="/m" />
			<beans:constructor-arg value="/quickspringmobile/spring" />
		</beans:bean>
	</interceptors>

These 3 interceptors enable device resolution, site preferences, and site switching, respectively. Device resolution tells you if the user is mobile or not. Site preferences gives the user the ability to switch between mobile or desktop. Site switching gives you the ability to redirect users to a dedicated mobile site.

4. The resolved device is available under the currentDevice request attribute. The site preference is available under the currentSitePreference request attribute.

You can pass the current Device to your @Controller methods by configuring DeviceWebArgumentResolver. You can also pass the current SitePreference by configuring SitePreferenceWebArgumentResolver.

	<annotation-driven>
		<argument-resolvers>
			<beans:bean class="org.springframework.mobile.device.DeviceWebArgumentResolver" />
			<beans:bean class="org.springframework.mobile.device.site.SitePreferenceWebArgumentResolver" />
		</argument-resolvers>
	</annotation-driven>

5. While still in servlet-context.xml change spring-mvc-3.0.xsd to spring-mvc-3.1.xsd. You can change all XSDs to use version 3.1, but that is not required to run our example.

6. In HomeController, change the home method from

	public String home(Model model) {

to

	public String home(Model model, Device device, SitePreference sitePreference) {

Then change the String

	"This is the message from the controller!"

to

	"deviceIsMobile= " + device.isMobile() + " prefersMobile=" + (sitePreference == SitePreference.MOBILE)

The add the necessary import statements.

	import org.springframework.mobile.device.Device;
	import org.springframework.mobile.device.site.SitePreference;

Add the controller method for handling mobile requests. This just adds an extra log and calls the same home controller method.

	@RequestMapping(value = "/m/", method = RequestMethod.GET)
	public String mobile(Model model, Device device, SitePreference sitePreference) {
		logger.info("Welcome mobile!");
		return home(model, device, sitePreference);
	}

7. Change the following line in HomeControllerTest from

	Assert.assertEquals("home", controller.home(model));

to

	HttpServletRequest request = new MockHttpServletRequest();
	Device device = DeviceUtils.getCurrentDevice(request);
	Assert.assertEquals("home", controller.home(model, device, SitePreference.MOBILE));

This will make your unit test class compile. Then add the necessary import statements.

	import org.springframework.mobile.device.Device;
	import org.springframework.mobile.device.DeviceUtils;
	import org.springframework.mobile.device.site.SitePreference;
	import org.springframework.mock.web.MockHttpServletRequest;

8. For site preferences, add the following before the end body tag in home.jsp.

<br />Site: <a href="?site_preference=normal">Normal</a> | <a href="?site_preference=mobile">Mobile</a>

9. To enable logging, edit log4j.xml, and change

	<logger name="org.application">

to

	<logger name="com.teamextension">

10. Run mvn tomcat:run and visit http://localhost:8080/quickspringmobile to see your project in action. Project source is also available for download.

For more information, please read the Spring Mobile Reference Manual.

This Post Has 11 Comments

  1. josete

    Hi !

    Thanks a lot for this tutorial, but it does not work for me.
    I followed all your steps, and when i try to reach the site via tomcat, i receive the following:

    Could not instantiate bean class [org.springframework.mobile.device.Device]: Specified class is an interface

  2. josete

    Found the error !

    Looks like the annotation-driven tags DO NOT WORK if they are put after the interceptors.

    And spring does not complain , a bit weird for me.

    Thanks a lot !

  3. pk

    Hi tried with the same spring version but annotation-driven tag does not seem to work with 3.1.1.RELEASE…any idea??

  4. Bienvenido David

    Hi pk. The downloadable project mentioned in the blog post uses 3.1.1.RELEASE. Try to run on your local.

  5. pk

    thanks David it worked, some extra characters were the culprit, my Bad 🙁

  6. nitingupta

    I have download the above app but when i am running the app it is saying:
    org.springframework.web.servlet.PageNotFound – No mapping found for HTTP request with URI [/quickspringmobile/spring/] in DispatcherServlet with name ‘appServlet’

    I am new to spring, so not getting such things..

  7. Bienvenido David

    I just tried it and it worked, so this is most likely a local issue. Here’s what I did. I downloaded and extracted the zip file. Opened a command window on the extracted folder and ran “mvn tomcat:run”. Waited for Tomcat to start and then went to http://localhost:8080/quickspringmobile.

  8. Krishna

    It worked well. Thanks

  9. Mat

    josete is right. I had to move the annotation driven tag to the top.

Comments are closed.