Question

I’m trying to use Spring to inject a SLF4J logger into a class like so:

@Component
public class Example {

  private final Logger logger;

  @Autowired
  public Example(final Logger logger) {
    this.logger = logger;
  }
}

I’ve found the FactoryBean class, which I’ve implemented. But the problem is that I cannot get any information about the injection target:

public class LoggingFactoryBean implements FactoryBean<Logger> {

    @Override
    public Class<?> getObjectType() {
        return Logger.class;
    }  

    @Override
    public boolean isSingleton() {  
        return false;
    }

    @Override
    public Logger getObject() throws Exception {
        return LoggerFactory.getLogger(/* how do I get a hold of the target class (Example.class) here? */);
    }
}   

Is FactoryBean even the right way to go? When using picocontainers factory injection, you get the Type of the target passed in. In guice it is a bit trickier. But how do you accomplish this in Spring?

Answer 1

I resolved it with a custom BeanFactory. If anyone comes up with a better solution, I would be happy to hear it. Anyway, here’s the bean factory:

import java.util.Set;

import org.slf4j.Logger;
import org.slf4j.LoggerFactory;
import org.springframework.beans.BeansException;
import org.springframework.beans.TypeConverter;
import org.springframework.beans.factory.config.DependencyDescriptor;
import org.springframework.beans.factory.support.DefaultListableBeanFactory;

public class CustomBeanFactory extends DefaultListableBeanFactory {

    public CustomBeanFactory() {
    }

    public CustomBeanFactory(DefaultListableBeanFactory delegate) {
        super(delegate);
    }

    @Override
    public Object resolveDependency(DependencyDescriptor descriptor,
            String beanName, Set<String> autowiredBeanNames,
            TypeConverter typeConverter) throws BeansException {
        //Assign Logger parameters if required      
        if (descriptor.isRequired()
                && Logger.class.isAssignableFrom(descriptor
                        .getMethodParameter().getParameterType())) {            
            return LoggerFactory.getLogger(descriptor.getMethodParameter()
                    .getDeclaringClass());
        } else {
            return super.resolveDependency(descriptor, beanName,
                    autowiredBeanNames, typeConverter);
        }
    }
}

Example usage with an XML config:

        CustomBeanFactory customBeanFactory = new CustomBeanFactory();      
        GenericApplicationContext ctx = new GenericApplicationContext(customBeanFactory);
        XmlBeanDefinitionReader xmlReader = new XmlBeanDefinitionReader(ctx);
        xmlReader.loadBeanDefinitions(new ClassPathResource("beans.xml"));
        ctx.refresh();

EDIT:

Below you can find Arend v. Reinersdorffs improved version (see the comments for an explanation).

import java.lang.reflect.Field;
import java.util.Set;

import org.slf4j.Logger;
import org.slf4j.LoggerFactory;
import org.springframework.beans.BeansException;
import org.springframework.beans.TypeConverter;
import org.springframework.beans.factory.config.DependencyDescriptor;
import org.springframework.beans.factory.support.DefaultListableBeanFactory;
import org.springframework.core.MethodParameter;

public class CustomBeanFactory extends DefaultListableBeanFactory {

    public CustomBeanFactory() {
    }

    public CustomBeanFactory(DefaultListableBeanFactory delegate) {
        super(delegate);
    }

    @Override
    public Object resolveDependency(DependencyDescriptor descriptor,
            String beanName, Set<String> autowiredBeanNames,
            TypeConverter typeConverter) throws BeansException {
        //Assign Logger parameters if required      
        if (Logger.class == descriptor.getDependencyType()) {            
            return LoggerFactory.getLogger(getDeclaringClass(descriptor));
        } else {
            return super.resolveDependency(descriptor, beanName,
                    autowiredBeanNames, typeConverter);
        }
    }

    private Class<?> getDeclaringClass(DependencyDescriptor descriptor) {
        MethodParameter methodParameter = descriptor.getMethodParameter();
        if (methodParameter != null) {
            return methodParameter.getDeclaringClass();
        }
        Field field = descriptor.getField();
        if (field != null) {
            return field.getDeclaringClass();
        }
        throw new AssertionError("Injection must be into a method parameter or field.");
    }
}