How do you set cache headers in Spring MVC?

Question

In an annotation-based Spring MVC controller, what is the preferred way to set cache headers for a specific path?

Answer 1

The answer is quite simple:

@Controller
public class EmployeeController {

    @RequestMapping(value = "/find/employer/{employerId}", method = RequestMethod.GET)
    public List getEmployees(@PathVariable("employerId") Long employerId, final HttpServletResponse response) {
        response.setHeader("Cache-Control", "no-cache");
        return employeeService.findEmployeesForEmployer(employerId);
    }

}

Code above shows exactly what you want to achive. You have to do two things. Add "final HttpServletResponse response" as your parameter. And then set header Cache-Control to no-cache.

Answer 2

you can define a anotation for this: @CacheControl(isPublic = true, maxAge = 300, sMaxAge = 300), then render this anotation to HTTP Header with Spring MVC interceptor. or do it dynamic:

int age = calculateLeftTiming();
String cacheControlValue = CacheControlHeader.newBuilder()
      .setCacheType(CacheType.PUBLIC)
      .setMaxAge(age)
      .setsMaxAge(age).build().stringValue();
if (StringUtils.isNotBlank(cacheControlValue)) {
    response.addHeader("Cache-Control", cacheControlValue);
}

Implication can be found here: 优雅的Builder模式

BTW: I just found that Spring MVC has build-in support for cache control: Google WebContentInterceptor or CacheControlHandlerInterceptor or CacheControl, you will find it.

Answer 3

In your controller, you can set response headers directly.

response.setHeader("Cache-Control", "no-cache, no-store, must-revalidate");
response.setHeader("Pragma", "no-cache");
response.setDateHeader("Expires", 0);

Answer 4

You could use a Handler Interceptor and use the postHandle method provided by it:

http://static.springsource.org/spring/docs/2.0.x/api/org/springframework/web/servlet/HandlerInterceptor.html

postHandle(HttpServletRequest request, HttpServletResponse response, Object handler, ModelAndView modelAndView) 

then just add a header as follows in the method:

response.setHeader("Cache-Control", "no-cache");

Answer 5

Starting with Spring 4.2 you can do this:

import org.springframework.http.CacheControl;
import org.springframework.http.MediaType;
import org.springframework.http.ResponseEntity;
import org.springframework.web.bind.annotation.RequestMapping;
import org.springframework.web.bind.annotation.RequestMethod;
import org.springframework.web.bind.annotation.RestController;

import java.util.concurrent.TimeUnit;

@RestController
public class CachingController {
    @RequestMapping(method = RequestMethod.GET, path = "/cachedapi")
    public ResponseEntity<MyDto> getPermissions() {

        MyDto body = new MyDto();

        return ResponseEntity.ok()
            .cacheControl(CacheControl.maxAge(20, TimeUnit.SECONDS))
            .body(body);
    }
}

CacheControl object is a builder with many configuration options, see JavaDoc

Answer 6

I know this is a really old one, but those who are googling, this might help:

@Override
protected void addInterceptors(InterceptorRegistry registry) {

    WebContentInterceptor interceptor = new WebContentInterceptor();

    Properties mappings = new Properties();
    mappings.put("/", "2592000");
    mappings.put("/admin", "-1");
    interceptor.setCacheMappings(mappings);

    registry.addInterceptor(interceptor);
}