Web MVC with the Spring Framework
Juergen Hoeller
1.????? Introduction: Spring the Application Framework
When first confronted with the Spring Framework, one might be tempted to think: "Oh no, not yet another web framework". This article will outline why Spring isn't particularly a web framework but a generic lightweight application framework with dedicated web support, and show the architectural differences to Struts and WebWork
In contrast to Struts or WebWork, Spring is an application framework for all layers: It offers a bean configuration foundation, AOP support, a JDBC abstraction framework, abstract transaction support, etc. It is a very non-intrusive effort: Your application classes do not need to depend on any Spring classes if not necessary, and you can reuse every part on its own if you like to. From its very design, the framework encourages clean separation of tiers, most importantly web tier