How to test Spring session scoped beans

I wanted to use the http session just as a repository (database/files), to keep facebook access token for currently logged user. While I can manipulate session directly, another option is to declare the class as a session scoped bean in Spring. Somet…

I wanted to use the http session just as a repository (database/files), to keep facebook access token for currently logged user. While I can manipulate session directly, another option is to declare the class as a session scoped bean in Spring. Something like this:

public class RepositoryOnHttpSession {
    private String facebookAccessToken;

    public FacebookTemplate getFacebookTemplate() {
        return new FacebookTemplate(facebookAccessToken);
    }

    public void setFacebookAccessToken(String facebookAccessToken) {
        this.facebookAccessToken = facebookAccessToken;
    }    
}
<bean id="repositoryOnHttpSession" class="pl.touk.storytelling.infrastructure.repositories.RepositoryOnHttpSession" scope="session">
    <aop:scoped-proxy/>
</bean>

<aop:scoped-proxy/> makes Spring IoC container create a cglib proxy, and inject that to other singleton type beans instead. All nice and cool, except integration tests (which get Spring IoC container to inject all the dependencies) are blowing up with:

java.lang.IllegalStateException: No Scope registered for scope ‘session’

While there’s a lot of solutions to be googled (including redeclaring the object as a prototype/sinlgeton for test context, injecting mock http session and request), the easiest way to have a simple thread-bound session scope is just to declare it in the TEST IoC configuration, like below. Just keep in mind that junit fires all tests in a single thread by default, so the state is persisted between tests. You may need to clean it up in @After.

<bean class="org.springframework.beans.factory.config.CustomScopeConfigurer">
    <property name="scopes">
        <map>
            <entry key="session">
                <bean class="org.springframework.context.support.SimpleThreadScope"/>
            </entry>
        </map>
    </property>
</bean>
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Inconsistent Dependency Injection to domains with Grails

I've encountered strange behavior with a domain class in my project: services that should be injected were null. I've became suspicious as why is that? Services are injected properly in other domain classes so why this one is different?

Constructors experiment

I've created an experiment. I've created empty LibraryService that should be injected and Book domain class like this:

class Book {
def libraryService

String author
String title
int pageCount

Book() {
println("Finished constructor Book()")
}

Book(String author) {
this()
this.@author = author
println("Finished constructor Book(String author)")
}

Book(String author, String title) {
super()
this.@author = author
this.@title = title
println("Finished constructor Book(String author, String title)")
}

Book(String author, String title, int pageCount) {
this.@author = author
this.@title = title
this.@pageCount = pageCount
println("Finished constructor Book(String author, String title, int pageCount)")
}

void logInjectedService() {
println(" Service libraryService is injected? -> $libraryService")
}
}
class LibraryService {
def serviceMethod() {
}
}

Book has 4 explicit constructors. I want to check which constructor is injecting dependecies. This is my method that constructs Book objects and I called it in controller:

class BookController {
def index() {
constructAndExamineBooks()
}

static constructAndExamineBooks() {
println("Started constructAndExamineBooks")
Book book1 = new Book().logInjectedService()
Book book2 = new Book("foo").logInjectedService()
Book book3 = new Book("foo", 'bar').logInjectedService()
Book book4 = new Book("foo", 'bar', 100).logInjectedService()
Book book5 = new Book(author: "foo", title: 'bar')
println("Finished constructor Book(Map params)")
book5.logInjectedService()
}
}

Analysis

Output looks like this:

Started constructAndExamineBooks
Finished constructor Book()
Service libraryService is injected? -> eu.spoonman.refaktor.LibraryService@2affcce2
Finished constructor Book()
Finished constructor Book(String author)
Service libraryService is injected? -> eu.spoonman.refaktor.LibraryService@2affcce2
Finished constructor Book(String author, String title)
Service libraryService is injected? -> null
Finished constructor Book(String author, String title, int pageCount)
Service libraryService is injected? -> null
Finished constructor Book()
Finished constructor Book(Map params)
Service libraryService is injected? -> eu.spoonman.refaktor.LibraryService@2affcce2

What do we see?

  1. Empty constructor injects dependencies.
  2. Constructor that invokes empty constructor explicitly injects dependencies.
  3. Constructor that invokes parent's constructor explicitly does not inject dependencies.
  4. Constructor without any explicit call declared does not call empty constructor thus it does not inject dependencies.
  5. Constructor provied by Grails with a map as a parameter invokes empty constructor and injects dependencies.

Conclusion

Always explicitily invoke empty constructor in your Grail domain classes to ensure Dependency Injection! I didn't know until today either!