Mastering Apache Commons Chain in Spring Boot 3: Real‑World Examples

Introduction Apache Commons Chain is a subproject of Apache Commons that implements the Chain of Responsibility pattern. It provides a flexible way to organize and execute a series of commands, with support for Context, Command, Chain, Filter, and Catalog interfaces.

Core Interfaces

Context : a marker interface extending java.util.Map, representing the application state.

Command : a unit of work with a single method public boolean execute(Context context). It returns true to stop further execution.

Chain : implements Command, can contain other Commands or Chains, allowing nesting.

Filter : a special Command with a postprocess(Context, Exception) method for resource cleanup, executed in reverse order.

Catalog : a logical collection of named Commands, enabling lookup by name.

Basic Example

public class Command1 implements Command {
  public boolean execute(Context context) throws Exception {
    System.err.println("command1...");
    context.put("c1", "我是C1计算结果");
    return false;
  }
}
public class Command2 implements Command {
  public boolean execute(Context context) throws Exception {
    System.err.println("command2...");
    System.out.println(context.get("c1"));
    context.put("c2", "我是C2计算结果");
    return false;
  }
}
public class Command3 implements Command {
  public boolean execute(Context context) throws Exception {
    System.err.println("command3...");
    System.out.println(context.get("c2"));
    return false;
  }
}

Running the chain:

Context context = new ContextBase();
List<Command> commands = List.of(new Command1(), new Command2(), new Command3());
Chain chain = new ChainBase(commands);
chain.execute(context);

Output:

command1...
command2...
我是C1计算结果
command3...
我是C2计算结果

Resource Release

Commands that need cleanup can implement Filter. The postprocess method is called after execution in reverse order.

public class Command1 implements Command, Filter {
  public boolean postprocess(Context context, Exception exception) {
    System.err.println("C1释放资源");
    return exception == null;
  }
}
// similarly for Command2 and Command3

Result shows resources released in reverse order.

Catalog Management

CatalogBase catalog = new CatalogBase();
catalog.addCommand("c1", new Command1());
catalog.addCommand("c2", new Command2());
catalog.addCommand("c3", new Command3());

Map<String, Object> data = new HashMap<>();
Context context = new ContextBase(data);
Iterator<String> names = catalog.getNames();
while (names.hasNext()) {
  catalog.getCommand(names.next()).execute(context);
}

Exception Handling

If a Command throws an exception, execution stops, but Filters still run. The exception can be caught after chain.execute.

try {
  chain.execute(context);
} catch (Exception e) {
  System.err.printf("发生错误: %s%n", e.getMessage());
}

Spring Boot Integration Example

Define three Commands as Spring beans with @Component and @Order to control execution order, then inject them into a component that builds a Chain and runs it.

@Component
@Order(1)
public class ValidatorCommand implements Command { /* ... */ }

@Component
@Order(2)
public class HtmlCheckCommand implements Command { /* ... */ }

@Component
@Order(3)
public class SensitiveWordCommand implements Command { /* ... */ }

@Component
public class CharCheckComponent {
  private final List<Command> commands;
  private final Catalog catalog;
  // constructor injection and check method that builds ChainBase(commands) and executes
}

Running the Spring Boot application prints the execution flow of the three commands.

Note : The commons-chain project is no longer actively maintained and its servlet‑context implementation does not support Jakarta EE.