Joining properties together

[davidnewcomb]

I have used a SimpleUrlHandlerMapping bean in this example but the problem could relate to any bean that takes a Properties as an argument. My problem is that I would like to split the creation of my properties into different files to make it easier to manage and share resources across projects.

So my question is how do I join together properties in order to populate another properties property?

Best shown with an example. Currently I have all my controllers in the same file which i need to duplicate for different webapps.

webapp 1:

<bean id="urlMapping" class="org.springframework.web.servlet.handler.SimpleUrlHandlerMapping">

<property name="mappings">
   <props>
            	<!-- foo module -->
            	<prop key="/getfoo.html">getFooController</prop>
            	<!-- bar module -->
            	<prop key="/getbar.html">getBarController</prop>
            	<prop key="/listbar.html">listBarController</prop>
  </props>
</property>
</bean>

and webapp2:

<bean id="urlMapping" class="org.springframework.web.servlet.handler.SimpleUrlHandlerMapping">

<property name="mappings">
   <props>
            	<!-- foo module -->
            	<prop key="/getfoo.html">getFooController</prop>
            	<!-- war module -->
            	<prop key="/getwar.html">getWarController</prop>
            	<prop key="/setwar.html">setWarController</prop>
  </props>
</property>
</bean>

I would like to refactor it into:

<bean id="fooprops" class="something.that.does.this">
<property name="mappings">
   <props>
            	<!-- foo module -->
            	<prop key="/getfoo.html">getFooController</prop>
  </props>
</property>
</bean>

<bean id="barprops" class="something.that.does.this">
<property name="mappings">
   <props>
            	<!-- bar module -->
            	<prop key="/getbar.html">getBarController</prop>
            	<prop key="/listbar.html">listBarController</prop>
  </props>
</property>
</bean>

<bean id="warprops" class="something.that.does.this">
<property name="mappings">
   <props>
            	<!-- bar module -->
            	<prop key="/getwar.html">getWarController</prop>
            	<prop key="/setwar.html">setWarController</prop>
  </props>
</property>
</bean>

Now my webapp config is:

webapp 1:

<import resource="classpath:com.package.foo"/>
<import resource="classpath:com.package.bar"/>

<bean id="urlMapping" class="org.springframework.web.servlet.handler.SimpleUrlHandlerMapping">

<property name="mappings">
   <props-joined>
         fooprops
         barprops
   </props-joined>
</property>
</bean>

and webapp2 becomes

<import resource="classpath:com.package.foo"/>
<import resource="classpath:com.package.war"/>

<bean id="urlMapping" class="org.springframework.web.servlet.handler.SimpleUrlHandlerMapping">

<property name="mappings">
   <props-joined>
         fooprops
         warprops
   </props-joined>
</property>
</bean>

I know it's not like this, but you see what I mean. Is this possible? Is this how people do it or is there a better way?

[davidnewcomb]

Is it better to do this with properties files:
http://forum.springframework.org/sho...61&postcount=6