Various Spring MVC RequestMapping configuration questions

Question

I have several (albeit related) questions about Spring MVC RequestMapping configuration:

1. Say I have a type-level RequestMapping annotation as follows: @RequestMapping("/root/"). What is the difference between adding this method-level RequestMapping: @RequestMapping(value="leaf") and that one: @RequestMapping(value="/leaf")? Notice the leading slash in second method-level mapping.
2. What is the difference between having this type-level RequestMapping: @RequestMapping("/root/") and that one @RequestMapping("/root/*")? Notice the star in second mapping.
3. Say I already have a type-level RequestMapping annotation. How do I override the type-level mapping at the method-level so that the type-level mapping is ignored (for a given controller)?

Answer 1

• It should be same mapping in both cases - /root/leaf for both method level mapping

• Both are same, in both cases the type level mapping will be combined with the method level mapping to generate the full request path, so type level of /root/* with the method mapping will become /root/leaf - more rules are here - http://static.springsource.org/spring/docs/3.1.x/javadoc-api/org/springframework/util/AntPathMatcher.html#combine(java.lang.String, java.lang.String)

• I doubt if you can, type level mapping is combined with method level mapping to create the full path.