Overview

Spring Boot

Stacks26.8K

Followers24.3K

Votes1.0K

GitHub Stars78.9K

Forks41.6K

Java EE

Stacks550

Followers459

Votes2

Java EE vs Spring Boot: What are the differences?

Java EE and Spring Boot are two popular frameworks used for developing Java applications. Let's explore the key differences between them.

Development Philosophy: Java EE is a specification-driven framework that offers a set of standard APIs and services for enterprise application development. It follows a more traditional and heavyweight approach, requiring the use of an application server. On the other hand, Spring Boot is an opinionated, lightweight, and convention-based framework. It aims to simplify and accelerate development by providing a preconfigured environment with embedded servers. Spring Boot puts emphasis on developer productivity and ease of use.
Modularity and Flexibility: Java EE consists of a vast collection of APIs, services, and specifications, making it a comprehensive platform for enterprise applications. However, this extensive set of features can sometimes be overwhelming for simple applications or those with specific requirements. Spring Boot, on the other hand, follows a modular and flexible architecture. It allows developers to pick only the components they need from the extensive Spring ecosystem, making it more suitable for microservices or modular architectures.
Configuration and Convention over Configuration: Java EE requires extensive configuration through XML files and annotations, which can be time-consuming and require a deep understanding of the framework specifications. In contrast, Spring Boot encourages convention over configuration. It provides sensible defaults and automates configuration wherever possible, reducing the need for explicit configuration. This approach simplifies development and makes application configuration more intuitive.
Dependency Injection and Inversion of Control (IoC): Both Java EE and Spring Boot support dependency injection and IoC. However, Spring Boot's implementation is widely regarded as more powerful and advanced. Spring Boot's IoC container, called the Spring Container, provides a comprehensive and flexible model for managing dependencies. It also offers additional features like aspect-oriented programming (AOP) and integration with other Spring modules, making it more suitable for complex enterprise applications.
Community and Ecosystem: Spring Boot has a vibrant and active community that actively contributes to the development, maintenance, and improvement of the framework. It has a vast ecosystem of plugins, libraries, and community-driven projects that extend its functionality and provide additional features. Java EE, on the other hand, has a more mature but relatively slower-moving community. While Java EE has a wide variety of third-party libraries and frameworks available, its ecosystem may not be as extensive as Spring Boot's.
Ease of Adoption and Learning Curve: Java EE has a steeper learning curve due to its extensive set of specifications and APIs. It requires familiarity with various Java EE technologies like Servlets, JavaServer Pages (JSP), Enterprise JavaBeans (EJB), and Java Persistence API (JPA). Spring Boot, on the other hand, provides a more straightforward approach with a simpler API and excellent documentation. It has gained popularity for its ease of adoption and developer-friendly features.

In summary, Java EE is suitable for traditional enterprise applications that require a comprehensive platform, while Spring Boot is more suitable for lightweight, modular, and microservices-oriented applications that prioritize developer productivity and simplicity.

🔥 Trending in Frameworks on StackShare

Reify Frameworks

Reify

Try it View Docs Alternatives

Try

Advice on Spring Boot, Java EE

Eva

Fullstack developer

Jul 28, 2020

Needs adviceon

Java

Spring Boot

JavaScript

Hello, I am a fullstack web developer. I have been working for a company with Java/ Spring Boot and client-side JavaScript(mainly jQuery, some AngularJS) for the past 4 years. As I wish to now work as a freelancer, I am faced with a dilemma: which stack to choose given my current knowledge and the state of the market?

I've heard PHP is very popular in the freelance world. I don't know PHP. However, I'm sure it wouldn't be difficult to learn since it has many similarities with Java (OOP). It seems to me that Laravel has similarities with Spring Boot (it's MVC and OOP). Also, people say Laravel works well with Vue.js, which is my favorite JS framework.

On the other hand, I already know the Javascript language, and I like Vue.js, so I figure I could go the fullstack Javascript route with ExpressJS. However, I am not sure if these techs are ripe for freelancing (with regards to RAD, stability, reliability, security, costs, etc.) Is it true that Express is almost always used with MongoDB? Because my experience is mostly with SQL databases.

The projects I would like to work on are custom web applications/websites for small businesses. I have developed custom ERPs before and found that Java was a good fit, except for it taking a long time to develop. I cannot make a choice, and I am constantly switching between trying PHP and Node.js/Express. Any real-world advice would be welcome! I would love to find a stack that I enjoy while doing meaningful freelance coding.

826k views826k

Comments

Slimane

Jul 9, 2020

Needs adviceon

Spring Boot

NestJS

Node.js

I am currently planning to build a project from scratch. I will be using Angular as front-end framework, but for the back-end I am not sure which framework to use between Spring Boot and NestJS. I have worked with Spring Boot before, but my new project contains a lot of I/O operations, in fact it will show a daily report. I thought about the new Spring Web Reactive Framework but given the idea that Node.js is the most popular on handling non blocking I/O I am planning to start learning NestJS since it is based on Angular philosophy and TypeScript which I am familiar with. Looking forward to hear from you dear Community.

917k views917k

Comments

Milan

May 6, 2020

Needs adviceon

Spring Boot

Node.js

React

Hi, I am looking to select tech stack for front end and back end development. Considering Spring Boot vs Node.js for developing microservices. Front end tech stack is selected as React framework. Both of them are equally good for me, long term perspective most of services will be more based on I/O vs heavy computing. Leaning toward node.js, but will require team to learn this tech stack, so little hesitant.

650k views650k

Comments

Detailed Comparison

Spring Boot	Java EE
Spring Boot makes it easy to create stand-alone, production-grade Spring based Applications that you can "just run". We take an opinionated view of the Spring platform and third-party libraries so you can get started with minimum fuss. Most Spring Boot applications need very little Spring configuration.	It is developed using the Java Community Process, with contributions from industry experts, commercial and open source organizations, Java User Groups, and countless individuals. It offers a rich enterprise software platform and with over 20 compliant implementations to choose from.
Statistics
GitHub Stars 78.9K	GitHub Stars -
GitHub Forks 41.6K	GitHub Forks -
Stacks 26.8K	Stacks 550
Followers 24.3K	Followers 459
Votes 1.0K	Votes 2
Pros & Cons
Pros 149 Powerful and handy 134 Easy setup 128 Java 90 Spring 85 Fast Cons 23 Heavy weight 18 Annotation ceremony 13 Java 11 Many config files needed 5 Reactive	Pros 1 Inherits all java advantages 1 High level of security Cons 2 PAID
Integrations
Spring Java	Eclipse Spring NetBeans IDE

What are some alternatives to Spring Boot, Java EE?

Node.js

Node.js uses an event-driven, non-blocking I/O model that makes it lightweight and efficient, perfect for data-intensive real-time applications that run across distributed devices.

JavaScript

JavaScript is most known as the scripting language for Web pages, but used in many non-browser environments as well such as node.js or Apache CouchDB. It is a prototype-based, multi-paradigm scripting language that is dynamic,and supports object-oriented, imperative, and functional programming styles.

Python

Python is a general purpose programming language created by Guido Van Rossum. Python is most praised for its elegant syntax and readable code, if you are just beginning your programming career python suits you best.

Rails

Rails is a web-application framework that includes everything needed to create database-backed web applications according to the Model-View-Controller (MVC) pattern.

PHP

Fast, flexible and pragmatic, PHP powers everything from your blog to the most popular websites in the world.

Django

Django is a high-level Python Web framework that encourages rapid development and clean, pragmatic design.

Ruby

Ruby is a language of careful balance. Its creator, Yukihiro “Matz” Matsumoto, blended parts of his favorite languages (Perl, Smalltalk, Eiffel, Ada, and Lisp) to form a new language that balanced functional programming with imperative programming.

Laravel

It is a web application framework with expressive, elegant syntax. It attempts to take the pain out of development by easing common tasks used in the majority of web projects, such as authentication, routing, sessions, and caching.

Java

Java is a programming language and computing platform first released by Sun Microsystems in 1995. There are lots of applications and websites that will not work unless you have Java installed, and more are created every day. Java is fast, secure, and reliable. From laptops to datacenters, game consoles to scientific supercomputers, cell phones to the Internet, Java is everywhere!

Golang

Go is expressive, concise, clean, and efficient. Its concurrency mechanisms make it easy to write programs that get the most out of multicore and networked machines, while its novel type system enables flexible and modular program construction. Go compiles quickly to machine code yet has the convenience of garbage collection and the power of run-time reflection. It's a fast, statically typed, compiled language that feels like a dynamically typed, interpreted language.