Ah, It's Spring! Or, at Least the Java Spring Framework (
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Other than a season or something that you would find in a bed, Spring is also a relatively new way to build multi-tier Java applications. Marcus Zarra highlights what Spring is, why you might want to use it, and why it is becoming popular among Java devel
Although it has been said many times over the last few years, it bears repeating: J2EE development is hard. Using EJBs is probably one of the most complicated things you can do in Java. Building a multi-tier application using the J2EE 2.x specs requires a lot of dedication on the part of your developers and a very firm understanding of exactly how everything is supposed to fit together and why.
Even Java developers who have been using the language for years are baffled by the complexity of EJBs. While J2EE 3.0 has gone a long way towards resolving some of the issues, it is not, as of this writing, in its final form.
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The Spring Framework is an attempt to make building a multi-tier Java application easier. Spring is designed in a modular format so that you can pick and choose which pieces you wish to use. You can use its bean container and use Struts on the front-end, or use Hibernate or another JDBC persistence engine on the back-end... all while using Spring on the front-end. This flexibility allows you and your team to pick and choose Spring and other technologies, which is important if your team is more comfortable with something else. This can potentially lead to you maximizing your team's skill sets — something that is uncommon in Java's enterprise market.
But what is Spring? In the largest sense, Spring can replace your J2EE development. However, because it is modular, you can pick and choose which pieces of that development you wish to replace.
