Spring 4 MVC+Apache Tiles 3 Example

In this post we will integrate Apache Tiles 3 with Spring MVC 4, using annotation-based configuration. Apache Tiles is a template based, composite view framework: it allows to reuse page pieces across the application, keeping consistent look and feel. Page layouts in general contains several page-fragments like header,footer, menu & content. In a consistent layout, only content changes between page navigation while other page fragments like header,footer & menu remains fixed most of the time.

Tiles allows developers to define these page fragments which can be assembled into a complete pages at runtime.

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Following technologies being used:

Spring 4.2.6.RELEASE
Apache Tiles 3.0.5
Maven 3
JDK 1.7
Tomcat 8.0.21
Eclipse MARS.1 Release 4.5.1

Let’s begin.

Step 1: Create the directory structure

Following will be the final project structure:

Let’s now add the content mentioned in above structure explaining each in detail.

Step 2: Update pom.xml to include required dependencies

<project xsi:schemaLocation="http://maven.apache.org/POM/4.0.0 http://maven.apache.org/xsd/maven-4.0.0.xsd"

xmlns="http://maven.apache.org/POM/4.0.0" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance">

<modelVersion>4.0.0</modelVersion>

<groupId>com.websystique.springmvc</groupId>

<artifactId>Spring4MVCApacheTiles3Example</artifactId>

<packaging>war</packaging>

<version>1.0.0</version>

<name>Spring4MVCApacheTiles3Example</name>

<properties>

<springframework.version>4.2.6.RELEASE</springframework.version>

<apachetiles.version>3.0.5</apachetiles.version>

</properties>

<dependencies>

<dependency>

<groupId>org.springframework</groupId>

<artifactId>spring-core</artifactId>

<version>${springframework.version}</version>

</dependency>

<dependency>

<groupId>org.springframework</groupId>

<artifactId>spring-web</artifactId>

<version>${springframework.version}</version>

</dependency>

<dependency>

<groupId>org.springframework</groupId>

<artifactId>spring-webmvc</artifactId>

<version>${springframework.version}</version>

</dependency>

<dependency>

<groupId>org.apache.tiles</groupId>

<artifactId>tiles-core</artifactId>

<version>${apachetiles.version}</version>

</dependency>

<dependency>

<groupId>org.apache.tiles</groupId>

<artifactId>tiles-api</artifactId>

<version>${apachetiles.version}</version>

</dependency>

<dependency>

<groupId>org.apache.tiles</groupId>

<artifactId>tiles-servlet</artifactId>

<version>${apachetiles.version}</version>

</dependency>

<dependency>

<groupId>org.apache.tiles</groupId>

<artifactId>tiles-jsp</artifactId>

<version>${apachetiles.version}</version>

</dependency>

<dependency>

<groupId>javax.servlet</groupId>

<artifactId>javax.servlet-api</artifactId>

<version>3.1.0</version>

</dependency>

<dependency>

<groupId>javax.servlet.jsp</groupId>

<artifactId>javax.servlet.jsp-api</artifactId>

<version>2.3.1</version>

</dependency>

<dependency>

<groupId>javax.servlet</groupId>

<artifactId>jstl</artifactId>

<version>1.2</version>

</dependency>

</dependencies>

<build>

<pluginManagement>

<plugins>

<plugin>

<groupId>org.apache.maven.plugins</groupId>

<artifactId>maven-compiler-plugin</artifactId>

<version>3.2</version>

<configuration>

<source>1.7</source>

<target>1.7</target>

</configuration>

</plugin>

<plugin>

<groupId>org.apache.maven.plugins</groupId>

<artifactId>maven-war-plugin</artifactId>

<version>2.4</version>

<configuration>

<warSourceDirectory>src/main/webapp</warSourceDirectory>

<warName>Spring4MVCApacheTiles3Example</warName>

<failOnMissingWebXml>false</failOnMissingWebXml>

</configuration>

</plugin>

</plugins>

</pluginManagement>

<finalName>Spring4MVCApacheTiles3Example</finalName>

</build>

</project>

Apart from usual Spring dependencies, We have also added few dependencies for Apache Tiles 3. Additional dependencies can be added for more advanced tiles usage. Maven Apache-tiles page lists all the dependencies from basic to advanced usages.

Step 3: Configure Tiles

Configure tiles in Spring Application configuration file.

package com.websystique.springmvc.configuration;

import org.springframework.context.annotation.Bean;

import org.springframework.context.annotation.ComponentScan;

import org.springframework.context.annotation.Configuration;

import org.springframework.web.servlet.config.annotation.EnableWebMvc;

import org.springframework.web.servlet.config.annotation.ResourceHandlerRegistry;

import org.springframework.web.servlet.config.annotation.ViewResolverRegistry;

import org.springframework.web.servlet.config.annotation.WebMvcConfigurerAdapter;

import org.springframework.web.servlet.view.tiles3.TilesConfigurer;

import org.springframework.web.servlet.view.tiles3.TilesViewResolver;

@Configuration

@EnableWebMvc

@ComponentScan(basePackages = "com.websystique.springmvc")

public class AppConfig extends WebMvcConfigurerAdapter{

/**

* Configure TilesConfigurer.

*/

@Bean

public TilesConfigurer tilesConfigurer(){

TilesConfigurer tilesConfigurer = new TilesConfigurer();

tilesConfigurer.setDefinitions(new String[] {"/WEB-INF/views/**/tiles.xml"});

tilesConfigurer.setCheckRefresh(true);

return tilesConfigurer;

}

/**

* Configure ViewResolvers to deliver preferred views.

*/

@Override

public void configureViewResolvers(ViewResolverRegistry registry) {

TilesViewResolver viewResolver = new TilesViewResolver();

registry.viewResolver(viewResolver);

}

/**

* Configure ResourceHandlers to serve static resources like CSS/ Javascript etc...

*/

@Override

public void addResourceHandlers(ResourceHandlerRegistry registry) {

registry.addResourceHandler("/static/**").addResourceLocations("/static/");

}

Highlights of above configurations are TilesConfigurer & TilesViewResolver. TilesConfigurer simply configures a TilesContainer using a set of files containing definitions, to be accessed by TilesView instances. Definition files are basically XML files containing layout definitions.

In our Spring MVC application, we also need a ViewResolver. Spring comes with a Tiles specific ViewResolver named TilesViewResolver. Once configured, the view names returned from your controller methods will be treated as tiles view and Spring will look for a definition having the same name in definitions XML files.

Step 4: Create tiles definitions

Shown below is the definition file tiles.xml

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" ?>

<!DOCTYPE

tiles-definitions PUBLIC  "-//Apache Software Foundation//DTD Tiles Configuration 3.0//EN"  "http://tiles.apache.org/dtds/tiles-config_3_0.dtd">

<tiles-definitions>

<definition name="base-definition"

template="/WEB-INF/views/tiles/layouts/defaultLayout.jsp">

<put-attribute name="title" value="" />

<put-attribute name="header" value="/WEB-INF/views/tiles/template/defaultHeader.jsp" />

<put-attribute name="menu" value="/WEB-INF/views/tiles/template/defaultMenu.jsp" />

<put-attribute name="body" value="" />

<put-attribute name="footer" value="/WEB-INF/views/tiles/template/defaultFooter.jsp" />

</definition>

<definition name="home" extends="base-definition">

<put-attribute name="title" value="Welcome" />

<put-attribute name="body" value="/WEB-INF/views/pages/home.jsp" />

</definition>

<definition name="products" extends="base-definition">

<put-attribute name="title" value="Products" />

<put-attribute name="body" value="/WEB-INF/views/pages/products.jsp" />

</definition>

<definition name="contactus" extends="base-definition">

<put-attribute name="title" value="Contact Us" />

<put-attribute name="body" value="/WEB-INF/views/pages/contactus.jsp" />

</definition>

</tiles-definitions>

In above definition file, we have defined a base-definition and several other definitions extending base-definition. Other defintions are just overwriting the part they are specialized for. template attribute in definition-block is used to specify the actual layout file. Each of the definition (by name) can be treated as a tiles-view.

Step 5: Create Layouts

In our case we have defined a basic layout [/WEB-INF/views/tiles/layouts/defaultLayout.jsp] pinned with definition using template attribte.

defaultLayout.jsp

<%@ page language="java" contentType="text/html; charset=ISO-8859-1" pageEncoding="ISO-8859-1"%>

<%@ page isELIgnored="false" %>

<%@ taglib prefix="c" uri="http://java.sun.com/jsp/jstl/core"%>

<%@ taglib uri="http://tiles.apache.org/tags-tiles" prefix="tiles"%>

<html>

<head>

<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=ISO-8859-1">

<title><tiles:getAsString name="title" /></title>

<link href="<c:url value='/static/css/bootstrap.css' />" rel="stylesheet"></link>

<link href="<c:url value='/static/css/app.css' />" rel="stylesheet"></link>

</head>

<body>

<header id="header">

<tiles:insertAttribute name="header" />

</header>

<section id="sidemenu">

<tiles:insertAttribute name="menu" />

</section>

<section id="site-content">

<tiles:insertAttribute name="body" />

</section>

<footer id="footer">

<tiles:insertAttribute name="footer" />

</footer>

</body>

</html>

This layout file provides the consistent look-n-feel across your application. If you want to change layout, define a corresponding layout file and attach to the definition using template attribute.

As you can see, we have a header,footer,menu & body. We are using tags-tiles tag library to provide the placeholder within layout file. Attributes specified using insertAttribute will be provided by corresponding definition(or the one extending it).

Step 6: Create views

We have created some default views[used when the extending definition does not overwrite them] and some specific ones.
defaultHeader.jsp

<div>

<h1>Tiles Demo</h1>

</div>

defaultFooter.jsp

<div>

Made in this world.

</div>

defaultMenu.jsp

<nav>

<a href="${pageContext.request.contextPath}/"><img class="logo" src="${pageContext.request.contextPath}/static/img/Linux-icon.png"></a>

<ul id="menu">

<li><a href="${pageContext.request.contextPath}/">Home</a></li>

<li><a href="${pageContext.request.contextPath}/products">Products</a></li>

<li><a href="${pageContext.request.contextPath}/contactus">Contact Us</a></li>

</ul>

</nav>

home.jsp

<h2>Welcome to Home page</h2>

products.jsp

<h2>Products page</h2>

contactus.jsp

<h2>Contact Us Page</h2>

Step 7: Create Controller

package com.websystique.springmvc.controller;

import org.springframework.stereotype.Controller;

import org.springframework.ui.ModelMap;

import org.springframework.web.bind.annotation.RequestMapping;

import org.springframework.web.bind.annotation.RequestMethod;

@Controller

@RequestMapping("/")

public class AppController {

@RequestMapping(value = { "/"}, method = RequestMethod.GET)

public String homePage(ModelMap model) {

return "home";

}

@RequestMapping(value = { "/products"}, method = RequestMethod.GET)

public String productsPage(ModelMap model) {

return "products";

}

@RequestMapping(value = { "/contactus"}, method = RequestMethod.GET)

public String contactUsPage(ModelMap model) {

return "contactus";

}

Look at each of these controller methods. The returned value from them is treated as tiles-view [Thanks to TilesViewResolver] and corresponding tiles-definition gets consulted.

Step 8: Create Initializer

package com.websystique.springmvc.configuration;

import org.springframework.web.servlet.support.AbstractAnnotationConfigDispatcherServletInitializer;

public class AppInitializer extends AbstractAnnotationConfigDispatcherServletInitializer {

@Override

protected Class<?>[] getRootConfigClasses() {

return new Class[] { AppConfig.class };

}

@Override

protected Class<?>[] getServletConfigClasses() {

return null;

}

@Override

protected String[] getServletMappings() {

return new String[] { "/" };

}

Step 9: Build, deploy and Run Application

Now build the war (either by eclipse as was mentioned in previous tutorials) or via maven command line( mvn clean install). Deploy the war to a Servlet 3.0 container . Since here i am using Tomcat, i will simply put this war file into tomcat webapps folder and click on startup.bat inside tomcat/bin directory.

If you prefer to deploy from within Eclipse using tomcat: For those of us, who prefer to deploy and run from within eclipse, and might be facing difficulties setting Eclipse with tomcat, the detailed step-by-step solution can be found at : How to setup tomcat with Eclipse.

Open browser and browse at http://localhost:8080/Spring4MVCApacheTiles3Example/

Click on different menu items to see the content gets changes while preserving the actual look-n-feel.

Download Source Code

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References

http://websystique.com/springmvc/spring-4-mvc-apache-tiles-3-annotation-based-example/