Question

Is it ok to have more than 1 DispatcherServlet in web.xml to handle different URL ?
What’s the downside?

<servlet>
    <servlet-name>servlet1</servlet-name>
    <servlet-class>org.springframework.web.servlet.DispatcherServlet</servlet-class>
    <load-on-startup>2</load-on-startup>
</servlet>

<servlet>
    <servlet-name>servlet2</servlet-name>
    <servlet-class>org.springframework.web.servlet.DispatcherServlet</servlet-class>
    <load-on-startup>2</load-on-startup>
</servlet>


<servlet-mapping>
    <servlet-name>servlet1</servlet-name>
    <url-pattern>/url2/*</url-pattern>
</servlet-mapping>
<servlet-mapping>
    <servlet-name>servlet2</servlet-name>
    <url-pattern>/url1/*</url-pattern>
</servlet-mapping>

Answer 1

Yes, it is absolutely OK. Depending on app complexity and architecture, it actually may become very useful. You can use it to structure the application on dispatcher level (rather than on controllers). Or when you want certain URL classes to have different dispatcher configuration (view resolvers, locale resolvers, etc.)