Master Spring Boot Startup Tasks: Runners, Config, and Command-Line Tricks

Environment: Spring Boot 2.3.9

Execute Tasks After Application Startup

Implement ApplicationRunner or CommandLineRunner to run code after the application has started.

@SpringBootApplication
public class SpringBootFunctionsApplication implements ApplicationRunner {
    public static void main(String[] args) {
        SpringApplication.run(SpringBootFunctionsApplication.class, args);
        System.out.println("main method invoke...");
    }
    @Override
    public void run(ApplicationArguments args) throws Exception {
        System.out.println("ApplicationRunner executed after startup: " + Arrays.toString(args.getSourceArgs()));
    }
}

Execution result:

The run method of a Runner is invoked before SpringApplication.run completes.

Access Application Startup Arguments in Beans

You can inject ApplicationArguments into any bean to read the command‑line parameters.

@Configuration
public class ArgumentConfig {
    @Bean
    public Object object(ApplicationArguments args) {
        System.out.println(Arrays.toString(args.getSourceArgs()));
        return new Object();
    }
}

Execution result:

Generate Random Values in Configuration Files

Use Spring Boot’s ${random.*} placeholders in application.yml or application.properties:

user:
  password: ${random.value}
  age: ${random.int(100)}
  id: ${random.long}
  uuid: ${random.uuid}

Bind them to a bean:

@Component
@ConfigurationProperties(prefix = "user")
public class RandomProperties {
    private String password;
    private int age;
    private long id;
    private String uuid;
    // getters and setters omitted
}

Print the values after startup:

@SpringBootApplication
public class SpringBootFunctionsApplication implements ApplicationRunner, ApplicationContextAware {
    private ApplicationContext ctx;
    public static void main(String[] args) {
        SpringApplication.run(SpringBootFunctionsApplication.class, args);
    }
    @Override
    public void setApplicationContext(ApplicationContext applicationContext) {
        this.ctx = applicationContext;
    }
    @Override
    public void run(ApplicationArguments args) throws Exception {
        RandomProperties props = ctx.getBean(RandomProperties.class);
        System.out.println(props.getUuid() + "
" + props.getPassword() + "
" + props.getId() + "
" + props.getAge());
    }
}

Execution result:

Disable Command‑Line Properties

When running a Spring Boot jar, command‑line arguments like --server.port=5555 are added to the environment by default. To prevent this, disable the feature programmatically:

public static void main(String[] args) {
    SpringApplication app = new SpringApplication(SpringBootFunctionsApplication.class);
    app.setAddCommandLineProperties(false);
    app.run(args);
    System.out.println("main method invoke...");
}

Execution result:

Configuration File Loading Locations and Priority

Spring Boot loads configuration files in the following order (higher priority overrides lower):

/config subdirectory of the current directory

Current directory

/config directory on the classpath

Root of the classpath

By default it reads application.properties or application.yml. You can specify a different name: java -jar xxx.jar --spring.config.name=custom Or provide explicit locations:

java -jar xxx.jar --spring.config.location=classpath:/default.properties,classpath:/override.properties

YAML Configuration File Limitation

Spring’s @PropertySource does not support YAML files; it works only with .properties files.

@Configuration
@PropertySources({@PropertySource("classpath:config.yml")})
public class ArgumentConfig {
    // This will not be processed because YAML is not supported
}

Using @EnableConfigurationProperties

If a class is annotated only with @ConfigurationProperties and not with @Component, it will not be registered as a bean. Adding @EnableConfigurationProperties to a configuration class registers it:

@Configuration
@EnableConfigurationProperties(RandomProperties.class)
public class ArgumentConfig {
}
@ConfigurationProperties(prefix = "user")
public class RandomProperties {
    private String password;
    private int age;
    private long id;
    private String uuid;
    // getters and setters omitted
}

The above setup makes the RandomProperties bean available for injection.