Recently, the Java world has witnessed a dramatic shift away from so-called "heavyweight" architectures such as Enterprise JavaBeans (EJB) toward lighter weight frameworks such as Spring. Complex and container-dependent services, such as CMP, and transaction management systems have been replaced with simpler alternatives such as Hibernate and aspect-oriented programming (AOP). At the core, Spring provides a comprehensive, lightweight container based on the principle of Inversion of Control (IoC), on which you can build your own applications. On top of this container, Spring provides a myriad of useful services, bringing together a large range of highly competent open source projects into a single cohesive framework.

The quality of the Spring Framework has seen it replacing traditional Java EE architectures in many cases; as a result, more and more developers see the need for comprehensive Spring skills. Despite Spring having quite an extensive suite of documentation and examples, we feel that many developers are still struggling to understand how to use Spring and, more importantly, how to use it effectively. Because of this, we decided to write a new edition of Pro Spring.

At first, we thought we would just update a few chapters and call it Pro Spring 2.5. However, we quickly realized that Spring 2.5 brought so many new features and improvements that, although we kept the old Pro Spring name, this is a completely new book.

Through this book, you will learn how to use Spring to build better web and stand-alone applications and how to sift through the many choices available to you through the framework. Our aim is to provide you with all the knowledge you need to use Spring effectively in your own applications and to give you insight into what is happening behind the scenes in Spring.

For example, you will

After reading this book, you will be equipped with all the knowledge you need to build applications effectively using Spring and its related open source projects.