Spring Boot @Repository

last modified August 2, 2023

Spring Boot @Repository tutorial shows how to use the @Repository annotation in a Spring application.

Spring is a popular Java application framework and Spring Boot is an evolution of Spring that helps create stand-alone, production-grade Spring based applications easily.

@Repository

@Repository is a Spring annotation that indicates that the decorated class is a repository. A repository is a mechanism for encapsulating storage, retrieval, and search behavior which emulates a collection of objects. It is a specialization of the @Component annotation allowing for implementation classes to be autodetected through classpath scanning.

@ComponentScan ensures that the classes decorated with @Component and their derivatives including @Repository are found and registered as Spring beans. @ComponentScan is automatically included with @SpringBootApplication.

Spring Boot @Repository example

The following application demonstrates the usage of @Repository. It shows a list of countries in an HTML table to the user.

build.gradle
...
src
├── main
│   ├── java
│   │   └── com
│   │       └── zetcode
│   │           ├── Application.java
│   │           ├── controller
│   │           │   └── MyController.java
│   │           ├── model
│   │           │   └── Country.java
│   │           ├── repository
│   │           │   └── CountryRepository.java
│   │           └── service
│   │               ├── CountryService.java
│   │               └── ICountryService.java
│   └── resources
│       ├── application.yml
│       ├── import.sql
│       ├── static
│       │   └── index.html
│       └── templates
│           └── showCountries.ftlh
└── test
    ├── java
    └── resources

This is the project structure.

plugins {
    id 'org.springframework.boot' version '3.1.1'
    id 'io.spring.dependency-management' version '1.1.0'
    id 'java'
}

group = 'com.example'
version = '0.0.1-SNAPSHOT'
sourceCompatibility = '17'

repositories {
    mavenCentral()
}

dependencies {
    implementation 'org.springframework.boot:spring-boot-starter-web'
    implementation 'org.springframework.boot:spring-boot-starter-freemarker'
    implementation 'org.springframework.boot:spring-boot-starter-data-jpa'
    runtimeOnly 'com.h2database:h2'
}

This is the Gradle build file. The h2 dependency includes the H2 database driver.

Spring Boot starters are a set of convenient dependency descriptors which greatly simplify configuration. The spring-boot-starter-web enables web applications, both classic and RESTFul. The spring-boot-starter-web-freemarker is a starter for building web applications with Freemarker template engine. It uses Tomcat as the default embedded container. The spring-boot-starter-data-jpa is a starter for using Spring Data JPA with Hibernate.

server:
  port: 8086
  servlet:
    context-path: /SpringBootRepository
  
spring:
  main:
    banner-mode: "off"
  jpa:
    database: h2
    hibernate:
      dialect: org.hibernate.dialect.H2Dialect
      ddl-auto: create-drop

In the application.yml file we write various configuration settings of a Spring Boot application. The port sets for server port and the context-path context path (application name). After these settings, we access the application at localhost:8086/SpringBootRepository/. With the banner-mode property we turn off the Spring banner.

The JPA database value specifies the target database to operate on. We specify the Hibernate dialect, org.hibernate.dialect.H2Dialect in our case. The ddl-auto is the data definition language mode; the create-drop option automatically creates and drops the database schema. The H2 database is run in memory.

INSERT INTO countries(name, population) VALUES('China', 1382050000);
INSERT INTO countries(name, population) VALUES('India', 1313210000);
INSERT INTO countries(name, population) VALUES('USA', 324666000);
INSERT INTO countries(name, population) VALUES('Indonesia', 260581000);
INSERT INTO countries(name, population) VALUES('Brazil', 207221000);
INSERT INTO countries(name, population) VALUES('Pakistan', 196626000);
INSERT INTO countries(name, population) VALUES('Nigeria', 186988000);
INSERT INTO countries(name, population) VALUES('Bangladesh', 162099000);
INSERT INTO countries(name, population) VALUES('Nigeria', 186988000);
INSERT INTO countries(name, population) VALUES('Russia', 146838000);
INSERT INTO countries(name, population) VALUES('Japan', 126830000);
INSERT INTO countries(name, population) VALUES('Mexico', 122273000);
INSERT INTO countries(name, population) VALUES('Philippines', 103738000);
INSERT INTO countries(name, population) VALUES('Ethiopia', 101853000);
INSERT INTO countries(name, population) VALUES('Vietnam', 92700000);
INSERT INTO countries(name, population) VALUES('Egypt', 92641000);
INSERT INTO countries(name, population) VALUES('Germany', 82800000);
INSERT INTO countries(name, population) VALUES('the Congo', 82243000);
INSERT INTO countries(name, population) VALUES('Iran', 82800000);
INSERT INTO countries(name, population) VALUES('Turkey', 79814000);
INSERT INTO countries(name, population) VALUES('Thailand', 68147000);
INSERT INTO countries(name, population) VALUES('France', 66984000);
INSERT INTO countries(name, population) VALUES('United Kingdom', 60589000);
INSERT INTO countries(name, population) VALUES('South Africa', 55908000);
INSERT INTO countries(name, population) VALUES('Myanmar', 51446000);
INSERT INTO countries(name, population) VALUES('South Korea', 68147000);
INSERT INTO countries(name, population) VALUES('Colombia', 49129000);
INSERT INTO countries(name, population) VALUES('Kenya', 47251000);
INSERT INTO countries(name, population) VALUES('Spain', 46812000);
INSERT INTO countries(name, population) VALUES('Argentina', 43850000);
INSERT INTO countries(name, population) VALUES('Ukraine', 42603000);
INSERT INTO countries(name, population) VALUES('Sudan', 41176000);
INSERT INTO countries(name, population) VALUES('Algeria', 40400000);
INSERT INTO countries(name, population) VALUES('Poland', 38439000);

The schema is automatically created by Hibernate; later, the import.sql file is executed to fill the table with data.

package com.zetcode.model;

import jakarta.persistence.Entity;
import jakarta.persistence.GeneratedValue;
import jakarta.persistence.GenerationType;
import jakarta.persistence.Id;
import jakarta.persistence.Table;
import java.util.Objects;

@Entity
@Table(name = "countries")
public class Country {

    @Id
    @GeneratedValue(strategy = GenerationType.IDENTITY)
    private Long id;

    private String name;
    private int population;

    public Country() {
    }

    public Country(Long id, String name, int population) {
        this.id = id;
        this.name = name;
        this.population = population;
    }

    public Long getId() {
        return id;
    }

    public String getName() {
        return name;
    }

    public void setName(String name) {
        this.name = name;
    }

    public int getPopulation() {
        return population;
    }

    public void setPopulation(int population) {
        this.population = population;
    }

    @Override
    public boolean equals(Object o) {
        if (this == o) return true;
        if (o == null || getClass() != o.getClass()) return false;
        Country country = (Country) o;
        return population == country.population &&
                Objects.equals(id, country.id) &&
                Objects.equals(name, country.name);
    }

    @Override
    public int hashCode() {
        return Objects.hash(id, name, population);
    }

    @Override
    public String toString() {
        final StringBuilder sb = new StringBuilder("Country{");
        sb.append("id=").append(id);
        sb.append(", name='").append(name).append('\'');
        sb.append(", population=").append(population);
        sb.append('}');
        return sb.toString();
    }
}

This is the Country entity. Each entity must have at least two annotations defined: @Entity and @Id. Previously, we have set the ddl-auto option to create-drop which means that Hibernate will create the table schema from this entity.

@Entity
@Table(name = "countries")
public class Country {

The @Entity annotation specifies that the class is an entity and is mapped to a database table. The @Table annotation specifies the name of the database table to be used for mapping.

@Id
@GeneratedValue(strategy = GenerationType.IDENTITY)
private Long id;

The @Id annotation specifies the primary key of an entity and the @GeneratedValue gives the generation strategy for the values of primary keys.

package com.zetcode.repository;

import com.zetcode.model.Country;
import org.springframework.data.repository.CrudRepository;
import org.springframework.stereotype.Repository;

@Repository
public interface CountryRepository extends CrudRepository<Country, Long> {

}

CountryRepository is decorated with the @Repository annotation.

By extending from the Spring CrudRepository, we have some methods for our data repository implemented, including findAll. This saves some boilerplate code.

package com.zetcode.service;

import com.zetcode.model.Country;
import java.util.List;

public interface ICountryService {

    List<Country> findAll();
}

ICountryService contains the findAll contract method.

package com.zetcode.service;

import com.zetcode.model.Country;
import com.zetcode.repository.CountryRepository;
import org.springframework.stereotype.Service;

import java.util.List;

@Service
public class CountryService implements ICountryService {

    private final CountryRepository repository;

    public CountryService(CountryRepository repository) {
        this.repository = repository;
    }

    @Override
    public List<Country> findAll() {

        return (List<Country>) repository.findAll();
    }
}

CountryService contains the implementation of the findAll method.

private final CountryRepository repository;

public CountryService(CountryRepository repository) {
    this.repository = repository;
}

CountryRepository is injected.

@Override
public List<Country> findAll() {

    return (List<Country>) repository.findAll();
}

The findAll method returns the list of all countries from the database.

package com.zetcode.controller;

import com.zetcode.model.Country;
import com.zetcode.service.ICountryService;
import org.springframework.stereotype.Controller;
import org.springframework.web.bind.annotation.GetMapping;
import org.springframework.web.servlet.ModelAndView;

import java.util.HashMap;
import java.util.List;

@Controller
public class MyController {

    private final ICountryService countryService;

    public MyController(ICountryService countryService) {
        this.countryService = countryService;
    }

    @GetMapping("/countries")
    public ModelAndView getCountries() {

        var countries = (List<Country>) countryService.findAll();

        var params = new HashMap<String, Object>();
        params.put("countries", countries);

        return new ModelAndView("showCountries", params);
    }
}

MyController handles a request from the client.

@Controller
public class MyController {

A controller is annotated with @Controller annotation.

private final ICountryService countryService;

public MyController(ICountryService countryService) {
    this.countryService = countryService;
}

ICountryService is injected into the countryService attribute.

var countries = (List<Country>) countryService.findAll();

From the service object, we retrieve all countries with the findAll method.

var params = new HashMap<String, Object>();
params.put("countries", countries);

return new ModelAndView("showCountries", params);

The processing is send to the showCountries.ftlh template file, along with the list of countries.

<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
    <head>
        <title>Home page</title>
        <meta charset="UTF-8">
        <meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1.0">
    </head>
    <body>
        <p>
            <a href="countries">Show countries</a>
        </p>
    </body>
</html>

This is the home page. It contains a link to get all countries.

<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
    <head>
        <title>Show countries</title>
        <meta charset="UTF-8">
        <meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1.0">
        </head>

    <body>

        <h2>List of countries</h2>

        <table>
            <tr>
                <th>Id</th>
                <th>Name</th>
                <th>Population</th>
            </tr>

            <#list countries as country>
                <tr>
                    <td>${country.id}</td>
                    <td>${country.name}</td>
                    <td>${country.population}</td>
                </tr>
            </#list>
        </table>
    </body>
</html>

This is the showCountries.ftlh template file. With the #list directive, we show all the items from the list.

package com.zetcode;

import org.springframework.boot.SpringApplication;
import org.springframework.boot.autoconfigure.SpringBootApplication;

@SpringBootApplication
public class Application  {

    public static void main(String[] args) {
        SpringApplication.run(Application.class, args);
    }
}

Application is the entry point which sets up Spring Boot application. The @SpringBootApplication annotation enables auto-configuration and component scanning. It is a convenience annotation for @Configuration, @EnableAutoConfiguration, and @ComponentScan annotations.

$ ./gradlew bootRun

We run the application and navigate to localhost:8086/SpringBootRepository/.

In this article we have shown how to use @Repository annotation in a Spring application.

Author

My name is Jan Bodnar and I am a passionate programmer with many years of programming experience. I have been writing programming articles since 2007. So far, I have written over 1400 articles and 8 e-books. I have over eight years of experience in teaching programming.

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