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Table of Contents

@Configuration and @ConfigurationBuilder

Learn how to utilize @Configuration and @ConfigurationBuilder annotations to effectively configure declared properties.

Authors: Nirav Assar

Micronaut Version: 3.9.2

1. Getting Started

In this guide, we will create a Micronaut application written in Java.

In this guide you will learn how to effectively use the annotations @ConfigurationProperties, @ConfigurationBuilder, and @EachProperty to use configured properties in a Micronaut application. These annotations allow declared values to be injected into a bean for easy usage in the application.

2. What you will need

To complete this guide, you will need the following:

  • Some time on your hands

  • A decent text editor or IDE

  • JDK 1.8 or greater installed with JAVA_HOME configured appropriately

3. Solution

We recommend that you follow the instructions in the next sections and create the application step by step. However, you can go right to the completed example.

4. Writing the Application

Create an application using the Micronaut Command Line Interface or with Micronaut Launch.

mn create-app example.micronaut.micronautguide --build=maven --lang=java
If you don’t specify the --build argument, Gradle is used as the build tool.
If you don’t specify the --lang argument, Java is used as the language.

The previous command creates a Micronaut application with the default package example.micronaut in a directory named micronautguide.

Setup IntelliJ IDEA to develop Micronaut Applications.

5. Team Configuration with @ConfigurationProperties

Imagine a feature where you can configure a sports team in a declarative manner. The team has a few attributes like team name, color, and players.

src/main/resources/application.yml
team:
  name: 'Steelers'
  color: 'Black'
  player-names:
    - 'Mason Rudolph'
    - 'James Connor'

With the Micronaut framework, we can use the @ConfigurationProperties annotation to slurp the configuration into a bean. Each property that matches the configuration in the application.yml will call the setter in the bean. The bean will be subsequently available for injection in the application!

src/main/java/example/micronaut/TeamConfiguration.java
@ConfigurationProperties("team")
public class TeamConfiguration {
    private String name;
    private String color;
    private List<String> playerNames;

    public String getName() {
        return name;
    }

    public void setName(String name) {
        this.name = name;
    }

    public String getColor() {
        return color;
    }

    public void setColor(String color) {
        this.color = color;
    }

    public List<String> getPlayerNames() {
        return playerNames;
    }

    public void setPlayerNames(List<String> playerNames) {
        this.playerNames = playerNames;
    }
}

5.1. Test @ConfigurationProperties

Let’s validate that the bean is available in the application context and is created with the values declared in the application.yml.

src/test/java/example/micronaut/TeamConfigurationTest.java
    @Test
    void testTeamConfiguration() {
        List<String> names = Arrays.asList("Nirav Assar", "Lionel Messi");
        Map<String, Object> items = new HashMap<>();
        items.put("team.name", "evolution");
        items.put("team.color", "green");
        items.put("team.player-names", names);

        ApplicationContext ctx = ApplicationContext.run(items); (1)
        TeamConfiguration teamConfiguration = ctx.getBean(TeamConfiguration.class);

        assertEquals("evolution", teamConfiguration.getName());
        assertEquals("green", teamConfiguration.getColor());
        assertEquals(names.size(), teamConfiguration.getPlayerNames().size());
        names.forEach(name -> assertTrue(teamConfiguration.getPlayerNames().contains(name)));

        ctx.close();
    }
1 Set up configuration properties for the test to use

6. Team Admin Builder with @ConfigurationBuilder

The Builder pattern is a great way to build configuration objects incrementally. Read about the Builder pattern in this DZone article to learn more. The Framework supports the Builder pattern with @ConfigurationBuilder.

Let’s suppose we want to add team administrators to a team. The team administration is composed by using a builder pattern object. We can add a coach, manager and president to the team.

src/main/resources/application.yml
team:
  name: 'Steelers'
  color: 'Black'
  player-names:
    - 'Mason Rudolph'
    - 'James Connor'
  team-admin:
    manager: 'Nirav Assar' (1)
    coach: 'Mike Tomlin'
    president: 'Dan Rooney'
1 manager property is an example of an element that will be built

The TeamAdmin object abides by the Builder pattern.

src/main/java/example/micronaut/TeamAdmin.java
package example.micronaut;

public class TeamAdmin { (1)

    private String manager;
    private String coach;
    private String president;

    // should use the builder pattern to create the object
    private TeamAdmin() {
    }

    public String getManager() {
        return manager;
    }

    public void setManager(String manager) {
        this.manager = manager;
    }

    public String getCoach() {
        return coach;
    }

    public void setCoach(String coach) {
        this.coach = coach;
    }

    public String getPresident() {
        return president;
    }

    public void setPresident(String president) {
        this.president = president;
    }

    public static Builder builder() {
        return new Builder();
    }

    public static class Builder { (2)
        private String manager;
        private String coach;
        private String president;

        (3)
        public Builder withManager(String manager) {
            this.manager = manager;
            return this;
        }

        public Builder withCoach(String coach) {
            this.coach = coach;
            return this;
        }

        public Builder withPresident(String president) {
            this.president = president;
            return this;
        }

        public TeamAdmin build() { (4)
            TeamAdmin teamAdmin = new TeamAdmin();
            teamAdmin.manager = this.manager;
            teamAdmin.coach = this.coach;
            teamAdmin.president = this.president;
            return teamAdmin;
        }

        public String getManager() {
            return manager;
        }

        public String getCoach() {
            return coach;
        }

        public String getPresident() {
            return president;
        }
    }
}
1 TeamAdmin is the configuration object which consumes the declared properties.
2 The builder object is used to incrementally construct the object.
3 An example of a builder method, where a attribute is set and then the builder itself is returned.
4 The final build() method creates the TeamAdmin object.

At the bottom of TeamConfiguration, we add the inner class TeamAdmin.Builder and annotate it with @ConfigurationBuilder. This tells the Micronaut framework that configuration can be read in and an object can be constructed using the Builder pattern.

We are using the builder only here, so we will have to call builder.build() to actually get the TeamAdmin object, at a later time. In our case, we will call builder.build() in the JUnit test.
src/main/java/example/micronaut/TeamConfiguration.java
package example.micronaut;

import com.fasterxml.jackson.annotation.JsonIgnoreProperties;
import io.micronaut.context.annotation.ConfigurationBuilder;
import io.micronaut.context.annotation.ConfigurationProperties;
import io.micronaut.serde.annotation.Serdeable;

import java.util.List;

@Serdeable (1)
@JsonIgnoreProperties("builder") (2)
//tag::teamConfigClassNoBuilder[]
@ConfigurationProperties("team")
public class TeamConfiguration {
    private String name;
    private String color;
    private List<String> playerNames;
//end::teamConfigClassNoBuilder[]

    public TeamConfiguration() {
    }

    @ConfigurationBuilder(prefixes = "with", configurationPrefix = "team-admin") (3)
    protected TeamAdmin.Builder builder = TeamAdmin.builder(); (4)

    public TeamAdmin.Builder getBuilder() {
        return builder;
    }

    public void setBuilder(TeamAdmin.Builder builder) {
        this.builder = builder;
    }

    //tag::gettersandsetters[]
    public String getName() {
        return name;
    }

    public void setName(String name) {
        this.name = name;
    }

    public String getColor() {
        return color;
    }

    public void setColor(String color) {
        this.color = color;
    }

    public List<String> getPlayerNames() {
        return playerNames;
    }

    public void setPlayerNames(List<String> playerNames) {
        this.playerNames = playerNames;
    }
}
//end::gettersandsetters[]
1 Declare the @Serdeable annotation at the type level in your source code to allow the type to be serialized or deserialized.
2 Mark the builder as being ignored during serialization.
3 prefixes tells the Micronaut framework to find methods that are prefixed by with; configurationPrefix allows the developer to customize the application.yml element
4 Instantiate the builder object so it can be populated with configuration values.

6.1. Test @ConfigurationBuilder

We can validate @ConfigurationBuilder is applied properly with the following JUnit test. The test format is similar to previous tests.

src/test/java/example/micronaut/TeamConfigurationTest.java
    @Test
    void testTeamConfigurationBuilder() {
        List<String> names = Arrays.asList("Nirav Assar", "Lionel Messi");
        Map<String, Object> items = new HashMap<>();
        items.put("team.name", "evolution");
        items.put("team.color", "green");
        items.put("team.team-admin.manager", "Jerry Jones"); (1)
        items.put("team.team-admin.coach", "Tommy O'Neill");
        items.put("team.team-admin.president", "Mark Scanell");
        items.put("team.player-names", names);

        ApplicationContext ctx = ApplicationContext.run(items);
        TeamConfiguration teamConfiguration = ctx.getBean(TeamConfiguration.class);
        TeamAdmin teamAdmin = teamConfiguration.builder.build(); (2)

        assertEquals("evolution", teamConfiguration.getName());
        assertEquals("green", teamConfiguration.getColor());
        assertEquals("Nirav Assar", teamConfiguration.getPlayerNames().get(0));
        assertEquals("Lionel Messi", teamConfiguration.getPlayerNames().get(1));

        // check the builder has values set
        assertEquals("Jerry Jones", teamConfiguration.builder.getManager());
        assertEquals("Tommy O'Neill", teamConfiguration.builder.getCoach());
        assertEquals("Mark Scanell", teamConfiguration.builder.getPresident());

        // check the object can be built
        assertEquals("Jerry Jones", teamAdmin.getManager()); (3)
        assertEquals("Tommy O'Neill", teamAdmin.getCoach());
        assertEquals("Mark Scanell", teamAdmin.getPresident());

        ctx.close();
    }
1 Properties which will invoke the builder methods on TeamAdmin.Builder
2 The builder object is now configured, so we must run build() on it to create the TeamAdmin object
3 Verify the object is created with the applicaton.yml properties

7. Stadiums with @EachProperty

The Micronaut framework is also able to read a "list" of configurations that are related. Imagine we would like to declare stadiums and their attributes.

src/main/resources/application.yml
stadium:
  coors: (1)
    city: 'Denver'
    size: 50000
  pnc:
    city: 'Pittsburgh'
    size: 35000
1 This element will be the name of the bean.

We can use @EachProperty which will cycle through the configuration and read each nested clause as a bean. The higher level property will be parameterized as the name.

src/main/java/example/micronaut/StadiumConfiguration.java
package example.micronaut;

import io.micronaut.context.annotation.EachProperty;
import io.micronaut.context.annotation.Parameter;
import io.micronaut.serde.annotation.Serdeable;

@Serdeable (1)
@EachProperty("stadium") (2)
public class StadiumConfiguration {
    private String name; (3)
    private String city;
    private Integer size;

    public StadiumConfiguration(@Parameter String name) { (2)
        this.name = name;
    }

    public String getName() {
        return name;
    }

    public void setName(String name) {
        this.name = name;
    }

    public String getCity() {
        return city;
    }

    public void setCity(String city) {
        this.city = city;
    }

    public Integer getSize() {
        return size;
    }

    public void setSize(Integer size) {
        this.size = size;
    }
}
1 Declare the @Serdeable annotation at the type level in your source code to allow the type to be serialized or deserialized.
2 Establish the top layer of configuration
3 name is read in from the property key and send as a parameter to the bean.

7.1. Test @EachProperty

Validate the configuration with a test. Notice multiple beans are created from the configuration. In a controller we can inject a particular StadiumConfiguration instance bean by using the @Named parameter with qualifier name.

src/test/java/example/micronaut/StadiumConfigurationTest.java
package example.micronaut;

import io.micronaut.context.ApplicationContext;
import io.micronaut.inject.qualifiers.Qualifiers;
import org.junit.jupiter.api.Test;

import java.util.HashMap;
import java.util.Map;

import static org.junit.jupiter.api.Assertions.assertEquals;

public class StadiumConfigurationTest {

    @Test
    void testStadiumConfiguration() {
        Map<String, Object> items = new HashMap<>();
        items.put("stadium.fenway.city", "Boston"); (1)
        items.put("stadium.fenway.size", 60000);
        items.put("stadium.wrigley.city", "Chicago"); (1)
        items.put("stadium.wrigley.size", 45000);

        ApplicationContext ctx = ApplicationContext.run(items);

        (2)
        StadiumConfiguration fenwayConfiguration = ctx.getBean(StadiumConfiguration.class, Qualifiers.byName("fenway"));
        StadiumConfiguration wrigleyConfiguration = ctx.getBean(StadiumConfiguration.class, Qualifiers.byName("wrigley"));

        assertEquals("fenway", fenwayConfiguration.getName());
        assertEquals(60000, fenwayConfiguration.getSize());
        assertEquals("wrigley", wrigleyConfiguration.getName());
        assertEquals(45000, wrigleyConfiguration.getSize());

        ctx.close();
    }
}
1 Multiple configurations can be declared for the same class.
2 Since there are multiple beans to retrieve a bean a Qualifier must be sent.

8. Running the Application

To run the application, use the ./mvnw mn:run command, which starts the application on port 8080.

9. Controller

Configuration beans can be injected into the application with just like any other beans. As a demonstration, create a controller where the beans are constructor injected. The StadiumConfiguration class has two instances, so for injection we need to use the @Named annotation with a qualifier name to specify the bean.

src/main/java/example/micronaut/MyController.java
package example.micronaut;

import io.micronaut.core.annotation.Nullable;
import io.micronaut.http.annotation.Controller;
import io.micronaut.http.annotation.Get;

import jakarta.inject.Named;

@Controller("/my")
public class MyController {

    private final TeamConfiguration teamConfiguration;
    private final StadiumConfiguration stadiumConfiguration;

    public MyController(@Nullable TeamConfiguration teamConfiguration,
                        @Nullable @Named("pnc") StadiumConfiguration stadiumConfiguration) { (1)
        this.teamConfiguration = teamConfiguration;
        this.stadiumConfiguration = stadiumConfiguration;
    }

    @Get("/team")
    public TeamConfiguration team() {
        return this.teamConfiguration;
    }

    @Get("/stadium")
    public  StadiumConfiguration stadium() {
        return this.stadiumConfiguration;
    }
}
1 Injection of configuration beans; @Named annotation is needed to choose which StadiumConfiguration instance is retrieved.
In the browser go to http://localhost:8080/my/team and http://localhost:8080/my/stadium.

Add test:

src/test/java/example/micronaut/MyControllerTest.java
package example.micronaut;

import io.micronaut.http.HttpRequest;
import io.micronaut.http.client.HttpClient;
import io.micronaut.http.client.annotation.Client;
import io.micronaut.test.extensions.junit5.annotation.MicronautTest;
import org.junit.jupiter.api.Test;

import jakarta.inject.Inject;

import java.util.Arrays;
import java.util.List;

import static org.junit.jupiter.api.Assertions.assertEquals;
import static org.junit.jupiter.api.Assertions.assertTrue;

@MicronautTest
public class MyControllerTest {

    @Inject
    @Client("/")
    HttpClient client;

    @Test
    void testMyTeam() {
        TeamConfiguration teamConfiguration = client.toBlocking()
                .retrieve(HttpRequest.GET("/my/team"), TeamConfiguration.class);
        assertEquals("Steelers", teamConfiguration.getName());
        assertEquals("Black", teamConfiguration.getColor());
        List<String> expectedPlayers = Arrays.asList("Mason Rudolph", "James Connor");
        assertEquals(expectedPlayers.size(), teamConfiguration.getPlayerNames().size());
        expectedPlayers.forEach(name -> assertTrue(teamConfiguration.getPlayerNames().contains(name)));
    }

    @Test
    void testMyStadium() {
        StadiumConfiguration conf = client.toBlocking()
                .retrieve(HttpRequest.GET("/my/stadium"), StadiumConfiguration.class);
        assertEquals("Pittsburgh", conf.getCity());
        assertEquals(35000, conf.getSize());
    }
}

10. Generate a Micronaut Application Native Executable with GraalVM

We will use GraalVM, the polyglot embeddable virtual machine, to generate a native executable of our Micronaut application.

Compiling native executables ahead of time with GraalVM improves startup time and reduces the memory footprint of JVM-based applications.

Only Java and Kotlin projects support using GraalVM’s native-image tool. Groovy relies heavily on reflection, which is only partially supported by GraalVM.

10.1. Native executable generation

The easiest way to install GraalVM on Linux or Mac is to use SDKMan.io.

Java 11
sdk install java 22.3.r11-grl
If you still use Java 8, use the JDK11 version of GraalVM.
Java 17
sdk install java 22.3.r17-grl

For installation on Windows, or for manual installation on Linux or Mac, see the GraalVM Getting Started documentation.

After installing GraalVM, install the native-image component, which is not installed by default:

gu install native-image

To generate a native executable using Maven, run:

./mvnw package -Dpackaging=native-image

The native executable is created in the target directory and can be run with target/micronautguide.

You can invoke the controller exposed by the native executable:

curl http://localhost:8080/my/stadium
curl http://localhost:8080/my/team

11. Next steps

Visit Micronaut Application Configuration to learn more.

12. Help with the Micronaut Framework

The Micronaut Foundation sponsored the creation of this Guide. A variety of consulting and support services are available.