Spring Boot Lifecycle

The lifecycle of a request in a Spring Boot application, as shown in the diagram, involves several
critical steps and components. Here is a detailed explanation of each stage in the lifecycle:

1. Request Initiation

 A client sends a request (HTTP or HTTPS) to the Spring Boot application.

 The request contains information such as the HTTP method (GET, POST, etc.), headers,
and optionally a body (for methods like POST or PUT).

2. Security Filter Chain

 The request first enters the SecurityFilterChain, which is part of Spring Security.

 Filters within the chain are executed in sequence. Examples include:

o Authentication Filters: Validate the user credentials (e.g., JWT tokens or session
cookies).

o Authorization Filters: Check if the user has the required permissions for the
requested resource.

o CorsFilter: Handles Cross-Origin Resource Sharing (CORS) policies.

o CSRF Protection Filter: Validates CSRF tokens to prevent cross-site request

 If authentication or authorization fails, the request is blocked, and an appropriate HTTP

3. Dispatcher Servlet

 After passing through the filters, the request reaches the DispatcherServlet, the central
component of the Spring MVC framework.

 Responsibilities of the DispatcherServlet:

o It acts as a front controller, routing incoming requests to appropriate handlers.

o It delegates to other components like HandlerMapping and HandlerAdapter to

4. Controller Layer

 The DispatcherServlet routes the request to a specific Controller, a component

 The Controller handles the request by:

o Performing input validation using annotations like @Valid or @RequestParam.

o Delegating the request to the Service Layer for business logic.

5. Service Layer

 The Service Layer contains the business logic and is typically annotated with @Service.

 This layer may perform:

o Data transformations.

o Complex business calculations.

o Interactions with external APIs or other services.

 The service calls the Repository Layer to access the database.

6. Repository Layer

 The Repository Layer interacts with the database and is often annotated with
@Repository.

 It uses frameworks like Spring Data JPA or Hibernate to:

o Perform CRUD operations.

o Execute custom queries.

o Manage transactions automatically if configured.

 Data fetched or saved in the database is returned back to the Service Layer.

7. Returning a Response

 The Service Layer returns the processed data to the Controller.

 The Controller:

o Wraps the response in a proper format (JSON, XML, etc.), depending on the
client’s request headers (Accept).

o Sets the HTTP response code (e.g., 200 OK, 404 Not Found) and other headers as
necessary.

8. View Resolver (Optional)

 If the application uses Thymeleaf, JSPs, or other template engines, the View Resolver
resolves the logical view name returned by the Controller to an actual view file (HTML,
etc.).
  For REST APIs, this step is skipped since the response is directly serialized as JSON or
XML.

9. Response Sent to the Client

 The DispatcherServlet sends the final response back to the client.

 The response includes:

o The HTTP status code.

o Headers (e.g., Content-Type, Cache-Control).

o The response body (JSON, XML, HTML, etc.).

Error Handling

 At any point in the lifecycle, exceptions can occur (e.g., invalid input, database errors).

 Spring provides global exception handling using:

o @ControllerAdvice and @ExceptionHandler annotations for custom error

o Default error pages or response objects for unhandled exceptions.

Key Points

1. Thread Handling: Each request is handled by a separate thread from the server's thread
pool, ensuring non-blocking parallel processing.

2. Performance Optimization:

o Filters and interceptors can short-circuit the lifecycle for invalid or unauthorized
requests.

o Caching strategies can reduce the load on the database.

3. Scalability: Microservices architecture and load balancers can distribute the requests
among multiple instances of the application.