Clone of start.spring.io - spring-boot

Question

I'm trying to build an instance of start.spring.io to use it in an air-gaped network. I have been working on it for three weeks and still I don't understand well what to do.
I have cloned start.spring.io from GitHub in a host connected to Internet.
There I can build the application without errors:
./mvnw clean install -DskipTests=true
Then if I true to run the application (../mwnw spring-boot:run from the start-site directory), I get the following error when the application starts, I mean is not an error trying to generate a project, and the application dies:
2022-12-19 17:53:21.170 INFO 2701 --- [ restartedMain] o.s.b.a.w.s.WelcomePageHandlerMapping : Adding welcome page: class path resource [static/index.html]
2022-12-19 17:53:21.264 WARN 2701 --- [ restartedMain] ConfigServletWebServerApplicationContext : Exception encountered during context initialization - cancelling refresh attempt: org.springframework.beans.factory.BeanCreationException: Error creating bean with name 'requestMappingHandlerMapping' defined in class path resource [org/springframework/boot/autoconfigure/web/servlet/WebMvcAutoConfiguration$EnableWebMvcConfiguration.class]: Invocation of init method failed; nested exception is java.lang.IllegalStateException: Failed to introspect Class [io.spring.initializr.web.controller.ProjectGenerationController] from ClassLoader [jdk.internal.loader.ClassLoaders$AppClassLoader#5cb0d902]
2022-12-19 17:53:21.272 INFO 2701 --- [ restartedMain] o.apache.catalina.core.StandardService : Stopping service [Tomcat]
2022-12-19 17:53:21.311 INFO 2701 --- [ restartedMain] ConditionEvaluationReportLoggingListener :
Error starting ApplicationContext. To display the conditions report re-run your application with 'debug' enabled.
2022-12-19 17:53:21.411 ERROR 2701 --- [ restartedMain] o.s.boot.SpringApplication : Application run failed
org.springframework.beans.factory.BeanCreationException: Error creating bean with name 'requestMappingHandlerMapping' defined in class path resource [org/springframework/boot/autoconfigure/web/servlet/WebMvcAutoConfiguration$EnableWebMvcConfiguration.class]: Invocation of init method failed; nested exception is java.lang.IllegalStateException: Failed to introspect Class [io.spring.initializr.web.controller.ProjectGenerationController] from ClassLoader [jdk.internal.loader.ClassLoaders$AppClassLoader#5cb0d902]
at org.springframework.beans.factory.support.AbstractAutowireCapableBeanFactory.initializeBean(AbstractAutowireCapableBeanFactory.java:1804) ~[spring-beans-5.3.23.jar:5.3.23]
at org.springframework.beans.factory.support.AbstractAutowireCapableBeanFactory.doCreateBean(AbstractAutowireCapableBeanFactory.java:620) ~[spring-beans-5.3.23.jar:5.3.23]
at org.springframework.beans.factory.support.AbstractAutowireCapableBeanFactory.createBean(AbstractAutowireCapableBeanFactory.java:542) ~[spring-beans-5.3.23.jar:5.3.23]
at org.springframework.beans.factory.support.AbstractBeanFactory.lambda$doGetBean$
...
So, I am not adding any special dependencies or initilializr dependencies other than those already included in the project. I use Java 17 from Bell Soft.
I am not about the Spring Boot version but I haven't modified anything in the project. The pom file in the top directory includes:
<parent>
<groupId>org.springframework.boot</groupId>
<artifactId>spring-boot-starter-parent</artifactId>
<version>2.7.5</version>
</parent>
About my dependencies I am using the initializer-bom:0.20.0-SNAPSHOT. I have also tried with other versions like 0.13.0 and 0.12.0 but the build fails in both cases for the start-site:
[INFO] -------------------------------------------------------------
[ERROR] COMPILATION ERROR :
[INFO] -------------------------------------------------------------
[ERROR] /workspaces/start.spring.io.ori/start-site/src/main/java/io/spring/start/site/extension/dependency/springcloud/SpringCloudContractKotlinDslGradleBuildCustomizer.java:[44,22] cannot find symbol
symbol: method snippets()
location: variable build of type io.spring.initializr.generator.buildsystem.gradle.GradleBuild
[ERROR] /workspaces/start.spring.io.ori/start-site/src/main/java/io/spring/start/site/extension/dependency/graalvm/HibernatePluginGroovyDslGradleBuildCustomizer.java:[39,22] cannot find symbol
symbol: method snippets()
location: variable build of type io.spring.initializr.generator.buildsystem.gradle.GradleBuild
[ERROR] /workspaces/start.spring.io.ori/start-site/src/main/java/io/spring/start/site/extension/dependency/springcloud/SpringCloudContractGroovyDslGradleBuildCustomizer.java:[36,22] cannot find symbol
symbol: method snippets()
location: variable build of type io.spring.initializr.generator.buildsystem.gradle.GradleBuild
[INFO] 3 errors
I wonder if this effort makes sense. If I manage to build the application, will I be able of generating code or does the application connect to somewhere else to retrieve the data required to generate the code?
I would appreciate any hints. Thanks

Answer 1

I will write my (potential) answer here, even though I don't really think that is a real answer but too big to make it as a comment.
My setup:
Amazon Coretto JDK 17 https://docs.aws.amazon.com/corretto/latest/corretto-17-ug/downloads-list.html (it is not JDK 17 from Bell Soft)
Windows 11 Home
So I went to https://github.com/spring-io/start.spring.io and cloned it.
git clone https://github.com/spring-io/start.spring.io.git
Then I went in the root directoy of the cloned project and ran following command:
./mvnw clean install
Here I got some errors while running the tests, but this shouldn't be way too tragic - I think they failed for me, because it tries to run some gradlew commands but they do fail, because I don't have Gradle installed on my PC, as I am always using the Gradle Wrapper.
Then I started the Spring Boot Application.
cd start-site
../mvnw spring-boot:run
The Spring Boot Application started:
022-12-20T15:01:03.510+01:00 INFO 16592 --- [ restartedMain] io.spring.start.site.StartApplication : No active profile set, falling back to 1 default profile: "default"
2022-12-20T15:01:03.573+01:00 INFO 16592 --- [ restartedMain] .e.DevToolsPropertyDefaultsPostProcessor : Devtools property defaults active! Set 'spring.devtools.add-properties' to 'false' to disable
2022-12-20T15:01:03.573+01:00 INFO 16592 --- [ restartedMain] .e.DevToolsPropertyDefaultsPostProcessor : For additional web related logging consider setting the 'logging.level.web' property to 'DEBUG'
2022-12-20T15:01:04.800+01:00 INFO 16592 --- [ restartedMain] o.s.b.w.embedded.tomcat.TomcatWebServer : Tomcat initialized with port(s): 8080 (http)
2022-12-20T15:01:04.809+01:00 INFO 16592 --- [ restartedMain] o.apache.catalina.core.StandardService : Starting service [Tomcat]
2022-12-20T15:01:04.810+01:00 INFO 16592 --- [ restartedMain] o.apache.catalina.core.StandardEngine : Starting Servlet engine: [Apache Tomcat/10.1.1]
2022-12-20T15:01:04.872+01:00 INFO 16592 --- [ restartedMain] o.a.c.c.C.[Tomcat].[localhost].[/] : Initializing Spring embedded WebApplicationContext
2022-12-20T15:01:04.873+01:00 INFO 16592 --- [ restartedMain] w.s.c.ServletWebServerApplicationContext : Root WebApplicationContext: initialization completed in 1298 ms
2022-12-20T15:01:05.371+01:00 INFO 16592 --- [ restartedMain] o.s.b.a.w.s.WelcomePageHandlerMapping : Adding welcome page: class path resource [static/index.html]
2022-12-20T15:01:05.823+01:00 INFO 16592 --- [ restartedMain] org.ehcache.core.EhcacheManager : Cache 'initializr.metadata' created in EhcacheManager.
2022-12-20T15:01:05.832+01:00 INFO 16592 --- [ restartedMain] org.ehcache.jsr107.Eh107CacheManager : Registering Ehcache MBean javax.cache:type=CacheConfiguration,CacheManager=urn.X-ehcache.jsr107-default-config,Cache=initializr.metadata
2022-12-20T15:01:05.832+01:00 INFO 16592 --- [ restartedMain] org.ehcache.jsr107.Eh107CacheManager : Registering Ehcache MBean javax.cache:type=CacheStatistics,CacheManager=urn.X-ehcache.jsr107-default-config,Cache=initializr.metadata
2022-12-20T15:01:05.835+01:00 INFO 16592 --- [ restartedMain] org.ehcache.core.EhcacheManager : Cache 'initializr.dependency-metadata' created in EhcacheManager.
2022-12-20T15:01:05.836+01:00 INFO 16592 --- [ restartedMain] org.ehcache.jsr107.Eh107CacheManager : Registering Ehcache MBean javax.cache:type=CacheConfiguration,CacheManager=urn.X-ehcache.jsr107-default-config,Cache=initializr.dependency-metadata
2022-12-20T15:01:05.836+01:00 INFO 16592 --- [ restartedMain] org.ehcache.jsr107.Eh107CacheManager : Registering Ehcache MBean javax.cache:type=CacheStatistics,CacheManager=urn.X-ehcache.jsr107-default-config,Cache=initializr.dependency-metadata
2022-12-20T15:01:05.839+01:00 INFO 16592 --- [ restartedMain] org.ehcache.core.EhcacheManager : Cache 'initializr.project-resources' created in EhcacheManager.
2022-12-20T15:01:05.841+01:00 INFO 16592 --- [ restartedMain] org.ehcache.jsr107.Eh107CacheManager : Registering Ehcache MBean javax.cache:type=CacheConfiguration,CacheManager=urn.X-ehcache.jsr107-default-config,Cache=initializr.project-resources
2022-12-20T15:01:05.841+01:00 INFO 16592 --- [ restartedMain] org.ehcache.jsr107.Eh107CacheManager : Registering Ehcache MBean javax.cache:type=CacheStatistics,CacheManager=urn.X-ehcache.jsr107-default-config,Cache=initializr.project-resources
2022-12-20T15:01:05.843+01:00 INFO 16592 --- [ restartedMain] org.ehcache.core.EhcacheManager : Cache 'initializr.templates' created in EhcacheManager.
2022-12-20T15:01:05.843+01:00 INFO 16592 --- [ restartedMain] org.ehcache.jsr107.Eh107CacheManager : Registering Ehcache MBean javax.cache:type=CacheConfiguration,CacheManager=urn.X-ehcache.jsr107-default-config,Cache=initializr.templates
2022-12-20T15:01:05.844+01:00 INFO 16592 --- [ restartedMain] org.ehcache.jsr107.Eh107CacheManager : Registering Ehcache MBean javax.cache:type=CacheStatistics,CacheManager=urn.X-ehcache.jsr107-default-config,Cache=initializr.templates
2022-12-20T15:01:06.026+01:00 INFO 16592 --- [ restartedMain] o.s.b.d.a.OptionalLiveReloadServer : LiveReload server is running on port 35729
2022-12-20T15:01:06.031+01:00 INFO 16592 --- [ restartedMain] o.s.b.a.e.web.EndpointLinksResolver : Exposing 2 endpoint(s) beneath base path '/actuator'
2022-12-20T15:01:06.078+01:00 INFO 16592 --- [ restartedMain] o.s.b.w.embedded.tomcat.TomcatWebServer : Tomcat started on port(s): 8080 (http) with context path ''
2022-12-20T15:01:06.089+01:00 INFO 16592 --- [ restartedMain] io.spring.start.site.StartApplication : Started StartApplication in 3.056 seconds (process running for 3.444)
2022-12-20T15:01:17.890+01:00 INFO 16592 --- [nio-8080-exec-1] o.a.c.c.C.[Tomcat].[localhost].[/] : Initializing Spring DispatcherServlet 'dispatcherServlet'
2022-12-20T15:01:17.891+01:00 INFO 16592 --- [nio-8080-exec-1] o.s.web.servlet.DispatcherServlet : Initializing Servlet 'dispatcherServlet'
2022-12-20T15:01:17.892+01:00 INFO 16592 --- [nio-8080-exec-1] o.s.web.servlet.DispatcherServlet : Completed initialization in 1 ms
2022-12-20T15:01:18.122+01:00 INFO 16592 --- [io-8080-exec-10] .s.SaganInitializrMetadataUpdateStrategy : Fetching Spring Boot metadata from https://spring.io/project_metadata/spring-boot
If I now call http://localhost:8080/ - it works, I didn't do absolutely nothing.
Could it maybe be your JDK? I mean the JDKs are similar but not the same... And you also asked:
I wonder if this effort makes sense. If I manage to build the
application, will I be able of generating code or does the application
connect to somewhere else to retrieve the data required to generate
the code? I would appreciate any hints. Thanks
I personally think, it could make sense but - as soon as I generated a project on my own Spring Initializr, I watched the console of the Spring Boot Application and could see the following log:
Fetching Spring Boot metadata from https://spring.io/project_metadata/spring-boot
So it looks, like this thing actually fetches data from the internet, now I don't know what options you have but I have two in mind.
You could try to fork the GitHub Project and try to remove this network call (if this is really the only one) - I couldn't see anything more in the logs atleast... The actual response of the Call looks pretty simple though:
{"id":"spring-boot","name":"Spring Boot","projectReleases":[{"version":"3.0.1-SNAPSHOT","versionDisplayName":"3.0.1-SNAPSHOT","current":false,"releaseStatus":"SNAPSHOT","snapshot":true},{"version":"3.0.0","versionDisplayName":"3.0.0","current":true,"releaseStatus":"GENERAL_AVAILABILITY","snapshot":false},{"version":"2.7.7-SNAPSHOT","versionDisplayName":"2.7.7-SNAPSHOT","current":false,"releaseStatus":"SNAPSHOT","snapshot":true},{"version":"2.7.6","versionDisplayName":"2.7.6","current":false,"releaseStatus":"GENERAL_AVAILABILITY","snapshot":false},{"version":"2.6.14","versionDisplayName":"2.6.14","current":false,"releaseStatus":"GENERAL_AVAILABILITY","snapshot":false},{"version":"2.5.14","versionDisplayName":"2.5.14","current":false,"releaseStatus":"GENERAL_AVAILABILITY","snapshot":false},{"version":"2.4.13","versionDisplayName":"2.4.13","current":false,"releaseStatus":"GENERAL_AVAILABILITY","snapshot":false}]}
You allow explicitly the URL https://spring.io/project_metadata/spring-boot to fetch data inside of your Air Gap Network (I don't know if this is viable though)
I hope this helps a bit?

Answer 2

There are many dependencies that start from the initializer for spring-boot. If you try to build within an air-gapped network, you will not have access to maven's repository for the dependencies. Try building the package outside the network, and capture the libraries required. Look to your ~/.m2/ folder for the copies of the libraries needed. I would recommend setting up a Nexus repository, and it will capture the libraries as you need them from an open network which you can then use on the air-gapped network.
If this is a secured network, you'll have to have all those files vetted and scanned before you can get them into the air-gapped network. Plan for this.
As you add additional annotations or dependencies, you will have to get them from maven central again. It's not ideal, but you might find someone who setup a project to include all spring-boot dependencies for just this situation.
Also, use the STS dev environment, and build your spring-boot to run with included libraries.