Return only string message from Spring MVC 3 Controller

Question

Can any one tell me how I can return string message from controller?

If i just return a string from a controller method then spring mvc treating it as a jsp view nam

Answer 1

This is just a note for those who might find this question later, but you don't have to pull in the response to change the content type. Here's an example below to do just that:

@RequestMapping(method = RequestMethod.GET, value="/controller")
public ResponseEntity displayUploadedFile()
{
  HttpHeaders headers = new HttpHeaders();
  String disposition = INLINE;
  String fileName = "";
  headers.setContentType(MediaType.APPLICATION_OCTET_STREAM);

  //Load your attachment here

  if (Arrays.equals(Constants.HEADER_BYTES_PDF, contentBytes)) {
    headers.setContentType(MediaType.valueOf("application/pdf"));
    fileName += ".pdf";
  }

  if (Arrays.equals(Constants.HEADER_BYTES_TIFF_BIG_ENDIAN, contentBytes)
      || Arrays.equals(Constantsr.HEADER_BYTES_TIFF_LITTLE_ENDIAN, contentBytes)) {
    headers.setContentType(MediaType.valueOf("image/tiff"));
    fileName += ".tif";
  }

  if (Arrays.equals(Constants.HEADER_BYTES_JPEG, contentBytes)) {
    headers.setContentType(MediaType.IMAGE_JPEG);
    fileName += ".jpg";
  }

  //Handle other types if necessary

  headers.add("Content-Disposition", , disposition + ";filename=" + fileName);
  return new ResponseEntity(uploadedBytes, headers, HttpStatus.OK);
}