Does spring mvc have response.write to output to the browser directly?

Question

I am using spring mvc with freetemplate.

In asp.net, you can write straight to the browser using Response.Write("hello, world");

Can you do this in spring mvc?

Answer 1

If you use an annotated controller (or non-annotated for that matter I believe...), you can use the method argument HttpServletResponse in your controller to get the output stream and then write to the screen - see http://download.oracle.com/docs/cd/E17410_01/javaee/6/api/javax/servlet/ServletResponse.html#getOutputStream%28%29

For more information about the parameters you can use in your controllers/handlers, see http://static.springsource.org/spring/docs/2.5.x/reference/mvc.html (section 13.11.4)

Answer 2

I'm sure it is possible in some contexts. For example, if you have the HttpServletResponse object available to you (as you do in a Controller, or if you write your own View), then you can call getWriter() or getOutputStream() and write to that.

But you need to be careful to make sure that what you are doing doesn't interfere with your use of FreeMarker templates. And I'm not sure if you could manage it from within a FreeMarker template.

Answer 3

You can either:

• get the HttpServletResponse and print to its Writer or OutputStream (depending on whether you want to send textual or binary data)

  @RequestMapping(value = "/something")
  public void helloWorld(HttpServletResponse response)  {
    response.getWriter().println("Hello World")
  }
  

• Use @ResponseBody:

  @RequestMapping(value = "/something")
  @ResponseBody
  public String helloWorld()  {
    return "Hello World";
  }
  

Thus your Hello World text will be written to the response stream.