Launch browser automatically after spring-boot webapp is ready

Question

How do I launch a browser automatically after starting the spring boot application.Is there any listener method callback to check if the webapp has been deployed and is read

Answer 1

If you package the application as a WAR file, configure an application server, like Tomcat, and restart the configured application server through your IDE, IDEs can automatically open a browser-tab.

If you want to package your application as a JAR file, your IDE will not be able to open a web browser, so you have to open a web browser and type the desired link(localhost:8080). But in the developing phase, taking these boring steps might be very tedious.

It is possible to open a browser with Java programming language after the spring-boot application gets ready. You can use the third-party library like Selenium or use the following code snippet.

The code snippet to open a browser

@EventListener({ApplicationReadyEvent.class})
private void applicationReadyEvent()
{
    if (Desktop.isDesktopSupported())
    {
        Desktop desktop = Desktop.getDesktop();
        try
        {
            desktop.browse(new URI(url));
        } catch (IOException | URISyntaxException e)
        {
            e.printStackTrace();
        }
    } else
    {
        Runtime runtime = Runtime.getRuntime();
        String[] command;

        String operatingSystemName = System.getProperty("os.name").toLowerCase();
        if (operatingSystemName.indexOf("nix") >= 0 || operatingSystemName.indexOf("nux") >= 0)
        {
            String[] browsers = {"opera", "google-chrome", "epiphany", "firefox", "mozilla", "konqueror", "netscape", "links", "lynx"};
            StringBuffer stringBuffer = new StringBuffer();

            for (int i = 0; i < browsers.length; i++)
            {
                if (i == 0) stringBuffer.append(String.format("%s \"%s\"", browsers[i], url));
                else stringBuffer.append(String.format(" || %s \"%s\"", browsers[i], url));
            }
            command = new String[]{"sh", "-c", stringBuffer.toString()};
        } else if (operatingSystemName.indexOf("win") >= 0)
        {
            command = new String[]{"rundll32 url.dll,FileProtocolHandler " + url};

        } else if (operatingSystemName.indexOf("mac") >= 0)
        {
            command = new String[]{"open " + url};
        } else
        {
            System.out.println("an unknown operating system!!");
            return;
        }

        try
        {
            if (command.length > 1) runtime.exec(command); // linux
            else runtime.exec(command[0]); // windows or mac
        } catch (IOException e)
        {
            e.printStackTrace();
        }
    }    
}

Using Selenium to open a browser

To use the selenium library add the following dependency to your pom.xml file.

    org.seleniumhq.selenium
    selenium-java
    3.141.59

Then in your main class, add the following code snippet.

@EventListener({ApplicationReadyEvent.class})
private void applicationReadyEvent()
{
    String url = "http://localhost:8080";

    // pointing to the download driver
    System.setProperty("webdriver.chrome.driver", "Downloaded-PATH/chromedriver");
    ChromeDriver chromeDriver = new ChromeDriver();
    chromeDriver.get(url);
}

Notice: It is possible to use most of the popular browsers like FirefoxDriver, OperaDriver, EdgeDriver, but it is necessary to download browsers' drivers beforehand.