Imperial Tuitions

Spring Boot for Beginners

This beginner level course introduces learners to Spring Boot and teaches them how to build professional Java web applications and REST APIs.

Learners will begin by understanding the Spring Framework, Spring Boot architecture, and project structure. They will then progress through dependency injection, REST API development, data validation, database integration, exception handling, testing, and basic application security.

The course uses practical examples and hands-on exercises to help learners develop the skills required to create, test, and run Spring Boot applications.

Course Prerequisites:

Basic knowledge of Java Programming

What you will learn?

1. Introduction to Spring and Spring Boot

Introduction to the Spring Framework
What is Spring Boot?
Benefits of using Spring Boot
Spring Framework versus Spring Boot
Understanding the Spring ecosystem
Spring Boot application architecture
Installing the required development tools
Creating a Spring Boot project using Spring Initializr
Running the first Spring Boot application
Understanding the project folder structure

2. Spring Boot Fundamentals

Understanding the @SpringBootApplication annotation
Auto-configuration
Component scanning
Starter dependencies
Embedded web servers
Understanding the application lifecycle
Configuring application.properties
Configuring application.yml
Changing the application port
Creating environment-specific configurations
Introduction to Spring Boot DevTools

3. Dependency Injection and Spring Beans

Understanding inversion of control
Understanding dependency injection
What is a Spring Bean?
Creating beans using annotations
Using @Component
Using @Service
Using @Repository
Using @Controller
Using @RestController
Constructor injection
Setter injection
Field injection
Understanding bean scope
Managing dependencies between application components

4. Building Web Applications

Introduction to Spring MVC
Understanding the Model-View-Controller pattern
Creating controllers
Mapping web requests
Using @RequestMapping
Using @GetMapping
Returning text and HTML responses
Passing data from controllers to views
Introduction to Thymeleaf
Creating dynamic web pages
Handling form submissions
Serving static resources

5. Building REST APIs

Introduction to REST
Understanding RESTful architecture
Identifying API resources
Designing API endpoints
Using HTTP methods
Creating REST controllers
Using @GetMapping
Using @PostMapping
Using @PutMapping
Using @PatchMapping
Using @DeleteMapping
Using path variables
Using query parameters
Reading request bodies
Returning JSON responses
Using ResponseEntity
Working with HTTP status codes
Testing APIs using Postman

6. Organising a Spring Boot Application

Understanding layered architecture
Creating model classes
Creating controllers
Creating service classes
Creating repository classes
Separating business logic from controllers
Using interfaces in the service layer
Creating Data Transfer Objects
Mapping entities to DTOs
Organising packages professionally
Understanding separation of concerns

7. Request Validation

Introduction to data validation
Adding validation dependencies
Using validation annotations
Using @NotNull
Using @NotBlank
Using @Size
Using @Min and @Max
Using @Email
Validating request bodies with @Valid
Handling validation errors
Creating custom validation messages
Introduction to custom validators

8. Database Integration

Introduction to persistence
Connecting Spring Boot to a database
Configuring database connection properties
Introduction to JDBC
Introduction to Object-Relational Mapping
Understanding JPA
Introduction to Hibernate
Creating entity classes
Using @Entity
Using @Id
Generating primary keys
Mapping entity fields to database columns
Creating database tables from entities
Viewing generated SQL statements

9. Spring Data JPA

Introduction to Spring Data JPA
Creating repository interfaces
Using JpaRepository
Saving records
Retrieving records
Updating records
Deleting records
Finding records by ID
Creating derived query methods
Searching by different fields
Sorting records
Introduction to pagination
Writing custom JPQL queries
Using native SQL queries

10. Entity Relationships

Introduction to database relationships
One-to-one relationships
One-to-many relationships
Many-to-one relationships
Many-to-many relationships
Using relationship annotations
Understanding cascading
Understanding fetch types
Managing parent and child records
Preventing circular JSON responses
Using DTOs with related entities

11. Exception Handling

Understanding application exceptions
Handling exceptions in controllers
Creating custom exception classes
Using @ExceptionHandler
Using @ControllerAdvice
Creating a global exception handler
Handling resource-not-found errors
Handling validation errors
Handling database errors
Creating consistent API error responses
Returning appropriate HTTP status codes