Spring Boot Complete Architecture Guide: From Foundation to Spring AI

This is the guide for developers who already know Spring Boot basics and want the full picture: every layer, every pattern, every production concern — from bean lifecycle internals through Resilience4j circuit breakers to Spring AI RAG pipelines and Kubernetes deployment. Each section assumes you know the basics and focuses on the decisions, pitfalls, and code that matter in production.

Master Architecture Diagram

The complete picture — every layer in a production Spring Boot service including Spring AI.

Spring Boot · Master Architecture

1. IoC Container: Bean Scopes and Lifecycle

Scopes

@Component
@Scope("prototype")           // new instance injected each time
public class ReportBuilder { ... }

@Component
@Scope(value = "request", proxyMode = ScopedProxyMode.TARGET_CLASS)
public class RequestContext { // safe injection into singletons
    private UUID correlationId = UUID.randomUUID();
}

Bean lifecycle hooks

@Service
public class LlmClientService {

    private ChatClient chatClient;

    @PostConstruct              // runs after all dependencies injected
    void init() {
        this.chatClient = ChatClient.builder(chatModel)
            .defaultSystem("You are a helpful assistant.")
            .build();
        log.info("LlmClientService initialized");
    }

    @PreDestroy                 // runs before bean removed from context
    void shutdown() {
        // flush metrics, close connections
    }
}

Disambiguation: @Primary, @Qualifier, @Lazy

// Multiple DataSource beans — mark one as default
@Bean @Primary
DataSource primaryDataSource() { ... }

@Bean
@Qualifier("readReplica")
DataSource readReplicaDataSource() { ... }

// Injection — explicit qualifier wins over @Primary
@Service
public class ReportService {
    public ReportService(@Qualifier("readReplica") DataSource ds) { ... }
}

// @Lazy — defer initialization until first use (useful for expensive beans)
@Service @Lazy
public class HeavyAnalyticsService { ... }

2. AOP: Aspect-Oriented Programming

AOP lets you add cross-cutting behaviour (logging, timing, security checks, auditing) to any method without modifying it. Spring AOP uses CGLIB proxies — only external calls through the Spring proxy are intercepted.

Complete @Aspect example

@Aspect
@Component
public class PerformanceAspect {

    private static final Logger log = LoggerFactory.getLogger(PerformanceAspect.class);

    // Reusable pointcut — all public methods in service package
    @Pointcut("execution(public * com.example.service..*(..))")
    public void serviceLayer() {}

    // Runs around every matched method
    @Around("serviceLayer()")
    public Object measureTime(ProceedingJoinPoint pjp) throws Throwable {
        long start = System.currentTimeMillis();
        try {
            return pjp.proceed();
        } finally {
            long elapsed = System.currentTimeMillis() - start;
            log.info("{}.{} took {}ms",
                pjp.getTarget().getClass().getSimpleName(),
                pjp.getSignature().getName(),
                elapsed);
        }
    }

    // Only before — e.g., audit log
    @Before("serviceLayer() && @annotation(com.example.annotation.Audited)")
    public void auditBefore(JoinPoint jp) {
        log.info("AUDIT {} called by {}",
            jp.getSignature().toShortString(),
            SecurityContextHolder.getContext().getAuthentication().getName());
    }

    // After returning — post-process result without try/catch
    @AfterReturning(pointcut = "serviceLayer()", returning = "result")
    public void afterReturning(JoinPoint jp, Object result) {
        // publish domain event, update cache key, etc.
    }
}

Enable AOP (auto-enabled with spring-boot-starter-aop):

@SpringBootApplication
@EnableAspectJAutoProxy   // explicit, but Spring Boot auto-configures this
public class Application { ... }

3. Configuration Properties and Profiles

Typed @ConfigurationProperties

Prefer @ConfigurationProperties over @Value for anything beyond a single property — it gives you type safety, IDE completion, and validation.

@ConfigurationProperties(prefix = "app.ai")
@Validated              // enforce constraints at startup
public record AiProperties(
    @NotBlank String provider,
    @Positive int maxTokens,
    @DecimalMin("0.0") @DecimalMax("2.0") double temperature,
    @NotNull LlmModel model,
    RetryConfig retry
) {
    public record RetryConfig(
        @Positive int maxAttempts,
        @Positive long backoffMs
    ) {}
}

public enum LlmModel { GPT_4O_MINI, LLAMA3, CLAUDE_HAIKU }

app:
  ai:
    provider: openai
    max-tokens: 1024          # relaxed binding: maxTokens
    temperature: 0.7
    model: gpt-4o-mini
    retry:
      max-attempts: 3
      backoff-ms: 500

Register in @SpringBootApplication class or use @EnableConfigurationProperties(AiProperties.class).

Profiles

# application.yml — shared defaults
spring:
  datasource:
    url: jdbc:postgresql://localhost:5432/myapp

---
# application-dev.yml
spring:
  config:
    activate:
      on-profile: dev
  datasource:
    url: jdbc:h2:mem:testdb
  jpa:
    show-sql: true

---
# application-prod.yml
spring:
  config:
    activate:
      on-profile: prod
  datasource:
    url: ${DB_URL}
    hikari:
      maximum-pool-size: 50

Activate via: SPRING_PROFILES_ACTIVE=prod env var, --spring.profiles.active=prod JVM arg, or test annotation.

@Component
@Profile("prod")          // only registered in prod profile
public class ProdEmailSender implements EmailSender { ... }

@Component
@Profile("!prod")         // all profiles except prod
public class LogEmailSender implements EmailSender { ... }

4. Application Events

Spring's event system decouples producers from consumers without external infrastructure.

// 1. Define the event
public record OrderCreatedEvent(UUID orderId, UUID customerId, BigDecimal total) {}

// 2. Publish it from the service
@Service
@Transactional
public class OrderService {

    private final ApplicationEventPublisher events;

    public Order create(CreateOrderRequest req) {
        Order order = repository.save(toEntity(req));
        // Event published synchronously inside the transaction
        events.publishEvent(new OrderCreatedEvent(order.getId(), req.customerId(), order.getTotal()));
        return order;
    }
}

// 3a. Listener that runs IN the same transaction (for audit log to same DB)
@Component
public class AuditListener {

    @EventListener
    public void onOrderCreated(OrderCreatedEvent event) {
        auditRepository.save(new AuditEntry("ORDER_CREATED", event.orderId()));
    }
}

// 3b. Listener that fires AFTER the transaction commits (for Kafka, email)
@Component
public class NotificationListener {

    @TransactionalEventListener(phase = TransactionPhase.AFTER_COMMIT)
    @Async                      // off the commit thread
    public void onOrderCreated(OrderCreatedEvent event) {
        kafkaTemplate.send("orders.created", event.orderId().toString(), event);
        emailService.sendOrderConfirmation(event.customerId(), event.orderId());
    }
}

5. Layered Architecture

Web Layer — @RestController

@RestController
@RequestMapping("/api/v1/orders")
@Validated
public class OrderController {

    private final OrderService orderService;

    public OrderController(OrderService orderService) {
        this.orderService = orderService;
    }

    @GetMapping("/{id}")
    public ResponseEntity<OrderResponse> getOrder(@PathVariable UUID id) {
        return ResponseEntity.ok(orderService.findById(id));
    }

    @PostMapping
    @ResponseStatus(HttpStatus.CREATED)
    public OrderResponse createOrder(@RequestBody @Valid CreateOrderRequest request) {
        return orderService.create(request);
    }

    // File upload
    @PostMapping("/attachments")
    public ResponseEntity<String> uploadAttachment(
            @RequestPart("file") MultipartFile file,
            @RequestParam UUID orderId) {
        if (file.getSize() > 10 * 1024 * 1024) {
            throw new FileTooLargeException("Max 10 MB");
        }
        return ResponseEntity.ok(storageService.store(orderId, file));
    }
}

CORS Configuration

@Configuration
public class WebConfig implements WebMvcConfigurer {

    @Override
    public void addCorsMappings(CorsRegistry registry) {
        registry.addMapping("/api/**")
            .allowedOrigins("https://buildingai.in")
            .allowedMethods("GET", "POST", "PUT", "DELETE")
            .allowedHeaders("Authorization", "Content-Type")
            .maxAge(3600);
    }
}

SSE — Server-Sent Events for streaming

@GetMapping(value = "/stream", produces = MediaType.TEXT_EVENT_STREAM_VALUE)
public Flux<ServerSentEvent<String>> streamOrderUpdates(@RequestParam UUID orderId) {
    return orderUpdateService.subscribe(orderId)
        .map(update -> ServerSentEvent.<String>builder()
            .id(update.id())
            .event("order-update")
            .data(update.toJson())
            .build());
}

6. Request Lifecycle: From HTTP to Database

7. Spring Security

Full JWT setup with custom UserDetailsService

@Service
public class AppUserDetailsService implements UserDetailsService {

    private final UserRepository userRepository;

    @Override
    public UserDetails loadUserByUsername(String username) throws UsernameNotFoundException {
        return userRepository.findByEmail(username)
            .map(user -> User.builder()
                .username(user.getEmail())
                .password(user.getPasswordHash())   // BCrypt hash
                .roles(user.getRoles().toArray(new String[0]))
                .build())
            .orElseThrow(() -> new UsernameNotFoundException("User not found: " + username));
    }
}

@Configuration
@EnableMethodSecurity
public class SecurityConfig {

    @Bean
    public SecurityFilterChain filterChain(HttpSecurity http) throws Exception {
        return http
            .csrf(AbstractHttpConfigurer::disable)
            .sessionManagement(s -> s.sessionCreationPolicy(SessionCreationPolicy.STATELESS))
            .authorizeHttpRequests(auth -> auth
                .requestMatchers("/api/v1/public/**", "/actuator/health/**").permitAll()
                .requestMatchers("/actuator/**").hasRole("ACTUATOR")
                .anyRequest().authenticated()
            )
            .oauth2ResourceServer(oauth2 -> oauth2
                .jwt(jwt -> jwt.jwtAuthenticationConverter(jwtAuthConverter())))
            .build();
    }

    @Bean
    JwtAuthenticationConverter jwtAuthConverter() {
        var grantedAuthoritiesConverter = new JwtGrantedAuthoritiesConverter();
        grantedAuthoritiesConverter.setAuthoritiesClaimName("roles");
        grantedAuthoritiesConverter.setAuthorityPrefix("ROLE_");
        var converter = new JwtAuthenticationConverter();
        converter.setJwtGrantedAuthoritiesConverter(grantedAuthoritiesConverter);
        return converter;
    }

    @Bean
    public PasswordEncoder passwordEncoder() {
        return new BCryptPasswordEncoder();
    }

    @Bean
    public JwtDecoder jwtDecoder() {
        return NimbusJwtDecoder.withJwkSetUri("https://auth.example.com/.well-known/jwks.json").build();
    }
}

Row-level security with @PostAuthorize:

@Service
public class OrderService {

    // @PreAuthorize runs before method — blocks early
    @PreAuthorize("hasRole('ADMIN') or @orderSecurity.isOwner(authentication, #id)")
    public OrderResponse findById(UUID id) { ... }

    // @PostAuthorize runs after — use when you need the return value to decide
    @PostAuthorize("returnObject.customerId == authentication.name")
    public OrderResponse findByIdForCustomer(UUID id) { ... }
}

8. Data Layer: JPA, Caching, Transactions

Entity with Spring Data Auditing

@MappedSuperclass
@EntityListeners(AuditingEntityListener.class)
public abstract class AuditableEntity {

    @CreatedDate
    @Column(updatable = false)
    private Instant createdAt;

    @LastModifiedDate
    private Instant updatedAt;

    @CreatedBy
    @Column(updatable = false)
    private String createdBy;

    @LastModifiedBy
    private String updatedBy;
}

@Entity
public class Order extends AuditableEntity {
    @Id @GeneratedValue(strategy = GenerationType.UUID)
    private UUID id;

    @Version    // optimistic locking
    private Long version;

    @OneToMany(mappedBy = "order", cascade = CascadeType.ALL, fetch = FetchType.LAZY)
    private List<OrderItem> items = new ArrayList<>();
}

// Wire auditing
@Configuration
@EnableJpaAuditing
public class JpaConfig {

    @Bean
    public AuditorAware<String> auditorProvider() {
        return () -> Optional.ofNullable(SecurityContextHolder.getContext().getAuthentication())
            .map(Authentication::getName);
    }
}

Specification API for dynamic queries

// Repository
public interface OrderRepository extends JpaRepository<Order, UUID>,
                                         JpaSpecificationExecutor<Order> {}

// Specifications as composable predicates
public class OrderSpecs {

    public static Specification<Order> byCustomer(UUID customerId) {
        return (root, query, cb) -> cb.equal(root.get("customerId"), customerId);
    }

    public static Specification<Order> withStatus(OrderStatus status) {
        return (root, query, cb) ->
            status == null ? cb.conjunction() : cb.equal(root.get("status"), status);
    }

    public static Specification<Order> createdAfter(Instant since) {
        return (root, query, cb) ->
            since == null ? cb.conjunction() : cb.greaterThan(root.get("createdAt"), since);
    }
}

// Usage — compose at call site
@Service
public class OrderService {

    public Page<OrderResponse> search(OrderSearchRequest req, Pageable pageable) {
        var spec = Specification.where(byCustomer(req.customerId()))
            .and(withStatus(req.status()))
            .and(createdAfter(req.since()));
        return orderRepository.findAll(spec, pageable).map(mapper::toResponse);
    }
}

Projections

// Interface projection — Spring Data generates the implementation
public interface OrderSummary {
    UUID getId();
    OrderStatus getStatus();
    BigDecimal getTotal();
    // Computed via SpEL
    @Value("#{target.total.multiply(T(java.math.BigDecimal).valueOf(1.2))}")
    BigDecimal getTotalWithTax();
}

// Class/DTO projection — use in @Query for constructor expressions
public record OrderStats(OrderStatus status, long count, BigDecimal totalRevenue) {}

@Query("SELECT new com.example.dto.OrderStats(o.status, COUNT(o), SUM(o.total)) " +
       "FROM Order o GROUP BY o.status")
List<OrderStats> getStatsByStatus();

Custom repository implementation

// Interface — add to your repository
public interface OrderRepositoryCustom {
    List<Order> findWithComplexCriteria(ComplexSearchRequest req);
}

// Impl — suffix must be "Impl"
@Repository
public class OrderRepositoryImpl implements OrderRepositoryCustom {

    private final EntityManager em;

    @Override
    public List<Order> findWithComplexCriteria(ComplexSearchRequest req) {
        var cb = em.getCriteriaBuilder();
        var cq = cb.createQuery(Order.class);
        var root = cq.from(Order.class);
        // Build dynamic criteria...
        return em.createQuery(cq).getResultList();
    }
}

// Extend both
public interface OrderRepository extends JpaRepository<Order, UUID>,
                                         JpaSpecificationExecutor<Order>,
                                         OrderRepositoryCustom {}

Caching with Redis

@Service
public class ProductService {

    @Cacheable(value = "products", key = "#id", unless = "#result == null")
    public ProductDto findById(UUID id) {
        return repository.findById(id).map(mapper::toDto).orElse(null);
    }

    @CachePut(value = "products", key = "#result.id")
    @Transactional
    public ProductDto update(UpdateProductRequest req) {
        return mapper.toDto(repository.save(mapper.toEntity(req)));
    }

    @CacheEvict(value = "products", key = "#id")
    @Transactional
    public void delete(UUID id) {
        repository.deleteById(id);
    }
}

9. Database Migrations with Flyway

Every production database needs versioned migrations. spring-boot-starter-flyway auto-configures Flyway and runs pending migrations on startup before the app accepts requests.

<dependency>
    <groupId>org.flywaydb</groupId>
    <artifactId>flyway-core</artifactId>
</dependency>
<dependency>
    <groupId>org.flywaydb</groupId>
    <artifactId>flyway-database-postgresql</artifactId>
</dependency>

spring:
  flyway:
    enabled: true
    locations: classpath:db/migration
    baseline-on-migrate: true       # for existing databases
    validate-on-migrate: true       # default: fail if applied migration changed

src/main/resources/db/migration/
  V1__create_orders.sql
  V2__add_order_items.sql
  V3__add_pgvector_extension.sql
  R__create_reporting_views.sql     # Repeatable: re-runs when checksum changes

-- V1__create_orders.sql
CREATE TABLE orders (
    id          UUID PRIMARY KEY DEFAULT gen_random_uuid(),
    customer_id UUID NOT NULL,
    status      VARCHAR(50) NOT NULL DEFAULT 'PENDING',
    total       NUMERIC(12,2) NOT NULL,
    version     BIGINT NOT NULL DEFAULT 0,
    created_at  TIMESTAMPTZ NOT NULL DEFAULT now(),
    updated_at  TIMESTAMPTZ NOT NULL DEFAULT now(),
    created_by  VARCHAR(255),
    updated_by  VARCHAR(255)
);

CREATE INDEX idx_orders_customer ON orders(customer_id);
CREATE INDEX idx_orders_status ON orders(status);

-- V3__add_pgvector_extension.sql
CREATE EXTENSION IF NOT EXISTS vector;
CREATE TABLE document_embeddings (
    id        UUID PRIMARY KEY DEFAULT gen_random_uuid(),
    content   TEXT NOT NULL,
    embedding vector(1536),
    metadata  JSONB
);
CREATE INDEX idx_embeddings ON document_embeddings
    USING ivfflat (embedding vector_cosine_ops) WITH (lists = 100);

10. Integration Patterns

Declarative HTTP Clients

@HttpExchange("https://api.inventory.internal")
public interface InventoryClient {

    @GetExchange("/products/{id}/stock")
    StockResponse getStock(@PathVariable UUID id);

    @PostExchange("/reservations")
    ReservationResponse reserve(@RequestBody ReservationRequest request);
}

@Configuration
public class ClientConfig {

    @Bean
    InventoryClient inventoryClient(RestClient.Builder builder) {
        var client = builder
            .baseUrl("https://api.inventory.internal")
            .requestInterceptor(new BearerTokenInterceptor())   // add auth
            .build();
        return HttpServiceProxyFactory
            .builderFor(RestClientAdapter.create(client))
            .build()
            .createClient(InventoryClient.class);
    }
}

Kafka Producer + Consumer

@Service
public class OrderEventPublisher {

    private final KafkaTemplate<String, OrderEvent> kafka;

    @Transactional
    public void publish(OrderEvent event) {
        kafka.send("orders.created", event.orderId().toString(), event);
        // Message sent only on transaction commit
    }
}

@Component
public class InventoryConsumer {

    @KafkaListener(topics = "orders.created", groupId = "inventory-svc",
                   containerFactory = "kafkaListenerContainerFactory")
    public void onOrderCreated(OrderEvent event, Acknowledgment ack) {
        try {
            inventoryService.deduct(event.items());
            ack.acknowledge();          // manual commit after successful processing
        } catch (TransientException e) {
            // don't ack — message will be redelivered
        }
    }
}

11. Async Processing and Scheduling

@Async with a custom executor

@Configuration
@EnableAsync
@EnableScheduling
public class AsyncConfig {

    @Bean("taskExecutor")
    public Executor taskExecutor() {
        var exec = new ThreadPoolTaskExecutor();
        exec.setCorePoolSize(5);
        exec.setMaxPoolSize(20);
        exec.setQueueCapacity(200);
        exec.setThreadNamePrefix("async-");
        exec.initialize();
        return exec;
    }
}

@Service
public class ReportService {

    @Async("taskExecutor")
    public CompletableFuture<ReportData> generateReport(UUID reportId) {
        // Runs on task executor thread pool, not the HTTP request thread
        var data = heavyComputation(reportId);
        return CompletableFuture.completedFuture(data);
    }
}

@Scheduled

@Component
public class DataRetentionJob {

    // Fixed rate — every 30 minutes
    @Scheduled(fixedRate = 30, timeUnit = TimeUnit.MINUTES)
    public void purgeExpiredSessions() { ... }

    // Fixed delay — 5 min after previous execution finishes
    @Scheduled(fixedDelay = 5, timeUnit = TimeUnit.MINUTES)
    public void syncCache() { ... }

    // Cron — every day at 02:00
    @Scheduled(cron = "0 0 2 * * *")
    public void generateDailyReport() { ... }

    // With zone
    @Scheduled(cron = "0 0 9 * * MON-FRI", zone = "Asia/Kolkata")
    public void sendMorningDigest() { ... }
}

12. Resilience Patterns with Resilience4j

Resilience4j provides circuit breaker, retry, rate limiter, and bulkhead as annotations or functional wrappers — with Spring Boot auto-configuration.

<dependency>
    <groupId>io.github.resilience4j</groupId>
    <artifactId>resilience4j-spring-boot3</artifactId>
</dependency>
<dependency>
    <groupId>org.springframework.boot</groupId>
    <artifactId>spring-boot-starter-aop</artifactId>
</dependency>

resilience4j:
  circuitbreaker:
    instances:
      inventoryService:
        slidingWindowSize: 10
        failureRateThreshold: 50       # open after 50% failures
        waitDurationInOpenState: 30s
        permittedNumberOfCallsInHalfOpenState: 3
  retry:
    instances:
      inventoryService:
        maxAttempts: 3
        waitDuration: 500ms
        retryExceptions:
          - java.net.ConnectException
          - java.util.concurrent.TimeoutException
  ratelimiter:
    instances:
      llmApi:
        limitForPeriod: 100
        limitRefreshPeriod: 1s
        timeoutDuration: 200ms

@Service
public class InventoryService {

    private final InventoryClient client;

    // Annotations stack: retry fires inside the circuit breaker
    @CircuitBreaker(name = "inventoryService", fallbackMethod = "stockFallback")
    @Retry(name = "inventoryService")
    public StockResponse getStock(UUID productId) {
        return client.getStock(productId);
    }

    // Fallback — same signature + Throwable parameter
    private StockResponse stockFallback(UUID productId, Throwable t) {
        log.warn("Inventory unavailable for {}, using cached/default", productId, t);
        return StockResponse.unknown(productId);    // degrade gracefully
    }
}

@Service
public class LlmService {

    @RateLimiter(name = "llmApi", fallbackMethod = "rateLimitFallback")
    public String call(String prompt) {
        return chatClient.prompt().user(prompt).call().content();
    }

    private String rateLimitFallback(String prompt, RequestNotPermitted ex) {
        return "Too many requests — please try again in a moment.";
    }
}

13. Spring Security: Advanced Patterns

See section 7 for the base SecurityFilterChain. Additional patterns:

// Rate limiting at filter level using Bucket4j
@Component
public class RateLimitFilter extends OncePerRequestFilter {

    private final Map<String, Bucket> buckets = new ConcurrentHashMap<>();

    @Override
    protected void doFilterInternal(HttpServletRequest req, HttpServletResponse res,
                                    FilterChain chain) throws ServletException, IOException {
        String clientIp = req.getRemoteAddr();
        Bucket bucket = buckets.computeIfAbsent(clientIp, k ->
            Bucket.builder()
                .addLimit(Bandwidth.classic(100, Refill.intervally(100, Duration.ofMinutes(1))))
                .build());

        if (bucket.tryConsume(1)) {
            chain.doFilter(req, res);
        } else {
            res.setStatus(429);
            res.getWriter().write("Rate limit exceeded");
        }
    }
}

14. Spring AI: Core Integration

Spring AI · Component Architecture

@Service
public class AiAssistantService {

    private final ChatClient chatClient;

    public AiAssistantService(ChatClient.Builder builder) {
        this.chatClient = builder
            .defaultSystem("You are a helpful enterprise assistant. Be concise and accurate.")
            .build();
    }

    // Simple call
    public String ask(String question) {
        return chatClient.prompt().user(question).call().content();
    }

    // Structured output — no manual JSON parsing
    public ProductSummary summarizeProduct(String description) {
        return chatClient.prompt()
            .user("Summarize this product: " + description)
            .call()
            .entity(ProductSummary.class);
    }

    // Per-call option override
    public String askWithHighTemperature(String question) {
        return chatClient.prompt()
            .user(question)
            .options(OpenAiChatOptions.builder().temperature(1.2).maxTokens(512).build())
            .call()
            .content();
    }

    // Streaming
    public Flux<String> streamAnswer(String question) {
        return chatClient.prompt().user(question).stream().content();
    }
}

15. Spring AI: PromptTemplate and Chat Memory

PromptTemplate with variables

@Service
public class DocumentSummaryService {

    private final ChatClient chatClient;

    private static final String SUMMARY_TEMPLATE = """
        You are a technical writer. Summarize the following document in {format} format.
        Focus on: {focusAreas}.
        
        Document:
        {content}
        """;

    public String summarize(String content, String format, String focusAreas) {
        var template = new PromptTemplate(SUMMARY_TEMPLATE);
        var prompt = template.create(Map.of(
            "format", format,
            "focusAreas", focusAreas,
            "content", content
        ));
        return chatClient.prompt(prompt).call().content();
    }
}

Chat Memory strategies

// In-memory (single instance — not suitable for multi-pod)
@Bean
public ChatMemory inMemoryChatMemory() {
    return new InMemoryChatMemory();
}

// Redis-backed (production — survives restarts, works across pods)
@Bean
public ChatMemory redisChatMemory(RedisTemplate<String, Object> redis) {
    return new RedisChatMemory(redis, Duration.ofHours(24));
}

// Wire into ChatClient with conversation scoping
@Service
public class ConversationalAssistant {

    private final ChatClient chatClient;

    public ConversationalAssistant(ChatClient.Builder builder, ChatMemory memory) {
        this.chatClient = builder
            .defaultAdvisors(new MessageChatMemoryAdvisor(memory))
            .build();
    }

    public String chat(String conversationId, String message) {
        return chatClient.prompt()
            .user(message)
            .advisors(a -> a.param(ChatMemory.CONVERSATION_ID_KEY, conversationId))
            .call()
            .content();
    }
}

Multimodal (image + text)

@Service
public class ImageAnalysisService {

    private final ChatClient chatClient;

    public String analyzeImage(byte[] imageBytes, String question) {
        var imageMessage = new UserMessage(question,
            List.of(new Media(MimeTypeUtils.IMAGE_JPEG,
                new ByteArrayResource(imageBytes))));

        return chatClient.prompt()
            .messages(imageMessage)
            .call()
            .content();
    }
}

16. Spring AI: RAG Pipeline

Spring AI · RAG Pipeline

@Service
public class RagService {

    private final ChatClient chatClient;

    public RagService(ChatClient.Builder builder, VectorStore vectorStore) {
        this.chatClient = builder
            .defaultSystem("""
                Use only the provided context to answer.
                If the answer is not in the context, say so clearly.
                Always cite the source document.
                """)
            .defaultAdvisors(
                new QuestionAnswerAdvisor(vectorStore,
                    SearchRequest.defaults()
                        .withTopK(5)
                        .withSimilarityThreshold(0.75)))
            .build();
    }

    public String answer(String question) {
        return chatClient.prompt().user(question).call().content();
    }
}

17. Spring AI: Tool Calling

@Service
public class OrderAiService {

    private final ChatClient chatClient;
    private final OrderRepository orderRepo;

    public OrderAiService(ChatClient.Builder builder, OrderRepository orderRepo) {
        this.orderRepo = orderRepo;
        this.chatClient = builder.defaultTools(this).build();
    }

    public String handleQuery(String userMessage) {
        return chatClient.prompt().user(userMessage).call().content();
    }

    @Tool(description = "Look up an order by its ID")
    public OrderSummary getOrder(UUID orderId) {
        return orderRepo.findById(orderId).map(mapper::toSummary).orElseThrow();
    }

    @Tool(description = "List recent orders for a customer in the last N days")
    public List<OrderSummary> listRecentOrders(UUID customerId, int days) {
        Instant since = Instant.now().minus(days, ChronoUnit.DAYS);
        return orderRepo.findByCustomerIdAndCreatedAtAfter(customerId, since)
            .stream().map(mapper::toSummary).toList();
    }
}

18. Observability

Custom HealthIndicator

@Component
public class LlmHealthIndicator implements HealthIndicator {

    private final ChatModel chatModel;

    @Override
    public Health health() {
        try {
            var response = chatModel.call(new Prompt("ping"));
            return response != null
                ? Health.up().withDetail("provider", "openai").build()
                : Health.down().withDetail("reason", "null response").build();
        } catch (Exception e) {
            return Health.down(e).withDetail("reason", e.getMessage()).build();
        }
    }
}

Custom Actuator endpoint

@Component
@Endpoint(id = "ai-stats")
public class AiStatsEndpoint {

    private final AiMetricsCollector metrics;

    @ReadOperation
    public AiStatsResponse stats() {
        return new AiStatsResponse(
            metrics.totalCalls(),
            metrics.totalInputTokens(),
            metrics.totalOutputTokens(),
            metrics.averageLatencyMs()
        );
    }
}

Access at /actuator/ai-stats.

Structured logging + trace correlation

<!-- logback-spring.xml -->
<appender name="JSON" class="ch.qos.logback.core.ConsoleAppender">
  <encoder class="net.logstash.logback.encoder.LogstashEncoder">
    <customFields>{"service":"order-service","env":"${SPRING_PROFILES_ACTIVE}"}</customFields>
  </encoder>
</appender>

# Export traces to Grafana Tempo or Jaeger via OTLP
management:
  otlp:
    tracing:
      endpoint: http://tempo:4318/v1/traces
  tracing:
    sampling:
      probability: 1.0
logging:
  pattern:
    console: "%d{ISO8601} [%X{traceId}/%X{spanId}] %-5level %logger{36} - %msg%n"

Every log line carries the traceId so you can correlate logs and traces in Grafana.

19. Testing

Testing pyramid

Unit tests — no Spring context

@ExtendWith(MockitoExtension.class)
class OrderServiceTest {

    @Mock OrderRepository repository;
    @Mock InventoryClient inventoryClient;
    @InjectMocks OrderService orderService;

    @Test
    void createOrder_shouldReserveInventoryAndSave() {
        var request = new CreateOrderRequest(/* ... */);
        var savedOrder = new Order(UUID.randomUUID(), request.customerId());
        when(repository.save(any())).thenReturn(savedOrder);

        var result = orderService.create(request);

        verify(inventoryClient).reserve(request.items());
        verify(repository).save(any(Order.class));
        assertThat(result.id()).isEqualTo(savedOrder.getId());
    }
}

Web layer slice — @WebMvcTest

@WebMvcTest(OrderController.class)
class OrderControllerTest {

    @Autowired MockMvc mockMvc;
    @MockBean OrderService orderService;          // only the service the controller needs
    @Autowired ObjectMapper objectMapper;

    @Test
    @WithMockUser(roles = "USER")
    void getOrder_shouldReturn200() throws Exception {
        var response = new OrderResponse(UUID.randomUUID(), OrderStatus.SHIPPED, BigDecimal.TEN);
        when(orderService.findById(any())).thenReturn(response);

        mockMvc.perform(get("/api/v1/orders/{id}", response.id())
                .contentType(MediaType.APPLICATION_JSON))
            .andExpect(status().isOk())
            .andExpect(jsonPath("$.status").value("SHIPPED"));
    }

    @Test
    @WithMockUser(roles = "USER")
    void createOrder_withInvalidBody_shouldReturn422() throws Exception {
        var body = new CreateOrderRequest(null, List.of()); // invalid — null customerId
        mockMvc.perform(post("/api/v1/orders")
                .contentType(MediaType.APPLICATION_JSON)
                .content(objectMapper.writeValueAsString(body)))
            .andExpect(status().isUnprocessableEntity());
    }
}

Data layer slice — @DataJpaTest + Testcontainers

@DataJpaTest
@AutoConfigureTestDatabase(replace = AutoConfigureTestDatabase.Replace.NONE)
@Testcontainers
class OrderRepositoryTest {

    @Container
    static PostgreSQLContainer<?> postgres = new PostgreSQLContainer<>("postgres:16")
        .withDatabaseName("testdb");

    @DynamicPropertySource
    static void configureProperties(DynamicPropertyRegistry registry) {
        registry.add("spring.datasource.url", postgres::getJdbcUrl);
        registry.add("spring.datasource.username", postgres::getUsername);
        registry.add("spring.datasource.password", postgres::getPassword);
    }

    @Autowired OrderRepository repository;

    @Test
    void findByCustomerId_shouldReturnMatchingOrders() {
        var customerId = UUID.randomUUID();
        repository.save(buildOrder(customerId, OrderStatus.SHIPPED));
        repository.save(buildOrder(customerId, OrderStatus.PENDING));
        repository.save(buildOrder(UUID.randomUUID(), OrderStatus.SHIPPED)); // other customer

        var orders = repository.findByCustomerIdAndStatus(customerId, OrderStatus.SHIPPED);

        assertThat(orders).hasSize(1);
        assertThat(orders.get(0).getStatus()).isEqualTo(OrderStatus.SHIPPED);
    }
}

Integration test — full context with Testcontainers

@SpringBootTest(webEnvironment = SpringBootTest.WebEnvironment.RANDOM_PORT)
@Testcontainers
class OrderIntegrationTest {

    @Container
    static PostgreSQLContainer<?> postgres = new PostgreSQLContainer<>("postgres:16");

    @Container
    static KafkaContainer kafka = new KafkaContainer(DockerImageName.parse("confluentinc/cp-kafka:7.6.0"));

    @DynamicPropertySource
    static void props(DynamicPropertyRegistry r) {
        r.add("spring.datasource.url", postgres::getJdbcUrl);
        r.add("spring.datasource.username", postgres::getUsername);
        r.add("spring.datasource.password", postgres::getPassword);
        r.add("spring.kafka.bootstrap-servers", kafka::getBootstrapServers);
    }

    @Autowired TestRestTemplate rest;

    @Test
    void createAndFetchOrder_endToEnd() {
        var request = new CreateOrderRequest(UUID.randomUUID(), List.of(/* items */));
        var created = rest.postForObject("/api/v1/orders", request, OrderResponse.class);

        assertThat(created).isNotNull();
        assertThat(created.status()).isEqualTo(OrderStatus.PENDING);

        var fetched = rest.getForObject("/api/v1/orders/{id}", OrderResponse.class, created.id());
        assertThat(fetched.id()).isEqualTo(created.id());
    }
}

Testing Spring AI

@SpringBootTest
class RagServiceTest {

    @MockBean ChatModel chatModel;       // avoid real LLM calls in tests
    @MockBean VectorStore vectorStore;
    @Autowired RagService ragService;

    @Test
    void answer_shouldQueryVectorStoreAndCallModel() {
        var docs = List.of(new Document("Spring Boot auto-configures Flyway migrations."));
        when(vectorStore.similaritySearch(any())).thenReturn(docs);
        when(chatModel.call(any(Prompt.class)))
            .thenReturn(new ChatResponse(List.of(new Generation("Flyway runs on startup."))));

        var answer = ragService.answer("How does Flyway work?");

        assertThat(answer).contains("Flyway");
        verify(vectorStore).similaritySearch(any());
        verify(chatModel).call(any(Prompt.class));
    }
}

20. Production: Containerization and Deployment

Graceful shutdown

server:
  shutdown: graceful          # wait for in-flight requests to complete
spring:
  lifecycle:
    timeout-per-shutdown-phase: 30s   # max wait per phase

Cloud Native Buildpacks (recommended)

# No Dockerfile needed — Spring Boot 3 builds an OCI image directly
./mvnw spring-boot:build-image -Dspring-boot.build-image.imageName=myapp:latest

# Run it
docker run -p 8080:8080 \
  -e SPRING_PROFILES_ACTIVE=prod \
  -e DB_URL=jdbc:postgresql://db:5432/myapp \
  myapp:latest

Minimal Dockerfile alternative

FROM eclipse-temurin:21-jre-alpine
WORKDIR /app
COPY target/myapp.jar app.jar
# Container-aware JVM flags
ENV JAVA_OPTS="-XX:MaxRAMPercentage=75.0 -XX:+UseZGC -XX:+ZGenerational"
ENTRYPOINT ["sh", "-c", "java $JAVA_OPTS -jar app.jar"]

Kubernetes liveness and readiness probes

spring:
  boot:
    admin:
      client:
        enabled: true
management:
  endpoint:
    health:
      probes:
        enabled: true    # splits /actuator/health/liveness and /actuator/health/readiness
  health:
    livenessstate:
      enabled: true
    readinessstate:
      enabled: true

# kubernetes deployment snippet
livenessProbe:
  httpGet:
    path: /actuator/health/liveness
    port: 8080
  initialDelaySeconds: 30
  periodSeconds: 10
readinessProbe:
  httpGet:
    path: /actuator/health/readiness
    port: 8080
  initialDelaySeconds: 10
  periodSeconds: 5

GraalVM native image

# Requires GraalVM JDK; Spring Boot 3 AOT generates reflection hints automatically
./mvnw -Pnative spring-boot:build-image

# Startup: ~80ms vs 4-8s JVM; memory: ~50MB vs 300MB+

21. Production Best Practices

HikariCP tuning

spring:
  datasource:
    url: ${DB_URL}
    username: ${DB_USER}
    password: ${DB_PASSWORD}
    hikari:
      maximum-pool-size: 20         # virtual threads: can be smaller than platform threads
      minimum-idle: 5
      connection-timeout: 3000      # ms — fail fast if pool exhausted
      idle-timeout: 600000          # 10 min
      max-lifetime: 1800000         # 30 min — rotate before DB kills idle connection
      validation-timeout: 1000
  jpa:
    open-in-view: false             # ALWAYS — prevents long connection holds
    properties:
      hibernate:
        jdbc.batch_size: 50
        order_inserts: true
  threads:
    virtual:
      enabled: true                 # Java 21 — free scalability win

Comprehensive best practices

FAQ

When should I use @TransactionalEventListener vs @EventListener? @EventListener runs inside the publishing transaction — use it when the listener writes to the same database (audit log, derived table). @TransactionalEventListener(AFTER_COMMIT) fires only after the transaction commits — required for Kafka publishes, emails, and any side effect that must not run if the DB rolls back.

How do I choose between Specification and @Query? Use Specification when filter combinations are dynamic and not known at compile time (user-facing search). Use @Query for complex fixed queries — it's simpler and easier to read when the query shape doesn't change.

Should I use virtual threads or a custom ThreadPoolTaskExecutor for @Async? With spring.threads.virtual.enabled=true, most @Async uses can drop the custom executor — virtual threads handle I/O concurrency efficiently. Keep a named executor only when you need bounded concurrency (e.g., limiting concurrent LLM calls to avoid rate limits).

Is Resilience4j's @CircuitBreaker compatible with virtual threads? Yes — Resilience4j 2.x is virtual-thread compatible. The thread-pool bulkhead type should be replaced with semaphore bulkhead when using virtual threads (thread-pool bulkhead creates platform threads internally).

How do I test Resilience4j circuit breakers? Use CircuitBreakerRegistry in your test to force the circuit open: registry.circuitBreaker("inventoryService").transitionToOpenState(). Then assert your fallback is called.

When should I switch to Spring WebFlux? With virtual threads, most reactive migration motivations (concurrency, back-pressure) disappear for typical CRUD apps. Choose WebFlux when you need true streaming backpressure end-to-end (SSE with slow consumers, live data pipelines), or when your whole stack (including drivers) is non-blocking.

Spring Boot is the most complete Java backend platform — from IoC internals through resilience, observability, and Spring AI. The master diagram shows every layer; the sections above give you the production-quality code, the gotchas, and the decisions for each. Build each layer deliberately, test each layer in isolation, and you'll have a system that's both fast to change and safe to operate.

More: Spring Boot 3 New Features, Virtual Threads in Spring Boot, Spring AI overview, pgvector RAG with Spring AI, LLM Observability, and AI ROI Framework.

Architecting a Spring Boot system and want an expert architecture review? Let's talk.