spring basic

[ben oliver]

Is Spring a frame work just like struts and tapestry ? what's special with Spring ?

If I want to use Hibernate then what's the framework I should pick ? Spring or struts/tapestry ?

[Chris Mathews]

Spring is much more than a web framework... in fact I would recommend against using Spring MVC for your web framework. Spring is a "lightweight" container that provides many services in the same vein as J2EE but without the requirement of a full-blown J2EE Application Server. The heart of Spring is a solid IoC implementation which can be used independently or utilized to access some of Spring more advanced features. These include: AOP, ORM (supports Hibernate, Ibatis, JDO, OJB, and TopLink), Declarative Transactioning, Remoting, Scheduling, and other features.

If I were to start a new project with Hibernate I would definitely heavily consider using Spring. Spring makes interacting with Hibernate much simpler. However, I leave Spring on the busines/service layer of the equation and use a web framework such as WebWork for the presentation layer.
[ March 29, 2006: Message edited by: Chris Mathews ]

[Christophe Verré]

in fact I would recommend against using Spring MVC for your web framework

Please could you explain why you're against it ?

[Peer Reynders]

From Comparing Web Frameworks
Spring MVC
Pros:

Lifecycle for overriding binding, validation, etc.

Integrates with many view options seamlessly: JSP/JSTL, Tiles, Velocity, FreeMarker, Excel, XSL, PDF.

Inversion of Control makes it easy to test.

Cons:

Configuration intensive - lots of XML

Requires lots of Code in JSPs

Almost too flexible - no common parent Controller

Check also Java Web Framework Sweet Spots.
Spring MVC also drove Max Habibi to write his article Evil Technology Rant. The ensuing discussion can be found here.

[Christophe Verré]

Thanks Peer, those PDFs are great.

[Peer Reynders]

Credit should go to Gregg Bolinger and Chris Mathews in the struts and tapestry topic - and of course Matt Raible for creating the PDFs in the first place. I just parroted the information.