Spring: Developing Java Applications for the Enterprise

Default request mapping method

Every Controller class can have one default request mapping method. What is the default request mapping method? If we simply don't specify any request path value in the @RequestMapping annotation of a Controller's method, that method is designated as the default request mapping method for that class. So whenever a request URL just ends up with the Controller's class level request path value without any further relative path down the line, then Spring MVC will invoke this method as a response to that request.

Tip

If you specify more than one default mapping method inside a Controller, you will get IllegalStateException with the message Ambiguous mapping found. So a Controller can have only one default request mapping ...