How to create a working TCP Server socket in spring boot and how to handle the incoming message?

Question

I have tried to implement a TCP server socket with spring integration in an allready existing spring boot application, but I am facing a problem and this problem drives me crazy... The client is sending a message (a byte array) to the server and timesout. That's it. I am not receiving any exceptions from the server. It seems I have provided the wrong port or somthing but after checking the port, I am sure it is the right one.

This is my annotation based configuration class:

import home.brew.server.socket.ServerSocketHandler;
import lombok.extern.log4j.Log4j2;
import org.springframework.beans.factory.annotation.Value;
import org.springframework.context.annotation.Bean;
import org.springframework.context.annotation.Configuration;
import org.springframework.integration.config.EnableIntegration;
import org.springframework.integration.dsl.IntegrationFlow;
import org.springframework.integration.dsl.IntegrationFlows;
import org.springframework.integration.ip.dsl.Tcp;

@Log4j2
@Configuration
@EnableIntegration
public class TcpServerSocketConfiguration {

    @Value("${socket.port}")
    private int serverSocketPort;

    @Bean
    public IntegrationFlow server(ServerSocketHandler serverSocketHandler) {
        TcpServerConnectionFactorySpec connectionFactory = 
            Tcp.netServer(socketPort) 
              .deserializer(new CustomSerializerDeserializer())
              .serializer(new CustomSerializerDeserializer())
              .soTcpNoDelay(true);

        TcpInboundGatewaySpec inboundGateway = 
           Tcp.inboundGateway(connectionFactory);

        return IntegrationFlows
         .from(inboundGateway)
         .handle(serverSocketHandler::handleMessage)
         .get();
    }

    @Bean
    public ServerSocketHandler serverSocketHandler() {
        return new ServerSocketHandler();
    }
}

I wanted to make the receive functionality work before I try to send an answer, so that's why have a minimal configuration.

And the following class should process the received message from the server socket

import lombok.extern.log4j.Log4j2;
import org.springframework.messaging.Message;
import org.springframework.messaging.MessageHeaders;
import org.springframework.messaging.MessagingException;

@Log4j2
public class ServerSocketHandler {

    public String handleMessage(Message<?> message, MessageHeaders messageHeaders) {
        log.info(message.getPayload());
        // TODO implement something useful to process the incoming message here...
        return message.getPayload().toString();
    } 
}

The handler method from above was never invoked even once! I have googled for some example implementations or tutorials but I haven't found anyhing what worked for me. I allready tried the implementations of these sites:

1. https://vispud.blogspot.com/2019/03/how-to-implement-simple-echo-socket.html
2. https://docs.spring.io/spring-integration/docs/current/reference/html/ip.html#note-nio
3. Spring Boot TCP Client

and a bunch of sites more... but nothing helped me :-(

UPDATE 1

I have implemented a custom serializer/deserializer:

import lombok.Data;
import lombok.extern.log4j.Log4j2;
import org.springframework.core.serializer.Deserializer;
import org.springframework.core.serializer.Serializer;

import java.io.IOException;
import java.io.InputStream;
import java.io.OutputStream;

@Log4j2
@Data
public class CustomSerializerDeserializer implements Serializer<byte[]>, 
Deserializer<byte[]> {


@Override
public byte[] deserialize(InputStream inputStream) throws IOException {
    return inputStream.readAllBytes();
}

@Override
public void serialize(byte[] object, OutputStream outputStream) throws IOException {
    outputStream.write(object);
}
}

After the client have sent a message, the custom serializer is invoked but the content ist always empty. I have no idea why.... The serializer needs a lot of time to read all bytes from the stream and in the end it is empty. The procedure is repeating all the time, so I think I have build an infinty loop by accident...

UPDATE 2

I have captured the communication between Client and server socket: It looks like I am stuck in the handshake and therefore there is no payload...

So if anybody could help me out with this, I would be very thankful and if you need some more information, just let me know.

Thanks in advance!

Answer 1

Well, after a few days of analysing and coding, I found the best solution for me to handle TCP socket communications using spring integration. For other developers who are struggling with the same problems. Here is what I've done so far.

This class contains a - for me working - annotation based TCP socket connection configuration

import org.springframework.beans.factory.annotation.Value;
import org.springframework.context.annotation.Bean;
import org.springframework.context.annotation.Configuration;
import org.springframework.integration.annotation.IntegrationComponentScan;
import org.springframework.integration.annotation.MessagingGateway;
import org.springframework.integration.channel.DirectChannel;
import org.springframework.integration.config.EnableIntegration;
import org.springframework.integration.ip.IpHeaders;
import org.springframework.integration.ip.tcp.TcpInboundGateway;
import org.springframework.integration.ip.tcp.TcpOutboundGateway;
import org.springframework.integration.ip.tcp.connection.AbstractClientConnectionFactory;
import org.springframework.integration.ip.tcp.connection.AbstractServerConnectionFactory;
import org.springframework.integration.ip.tcp.connection.TcpNetClientConnectionFactory;
import org.springframework.integration.ip.tcp.connection.TcpNetServerConnectionFactory;
import org.springframework.messaging.MessageChannel;
import org.springframework.messaging.handler.annotation.Header;
import org.springframework.web.context.request.RequestContextListener;

/**
 * Spring annotation based configuration
 */
@Configuration
@EnableIntegration
@IntegrationComponentScan
public class TcpServerSocketConfiguration {

    public static final CustomSerializerDeserializer SERIALIZER = new CustomSerializerDeserializer();
    @Value("${socket.port}")
    private int socketPort;

    /**
     * Reply messages are routed to the connection only if the reply contains the ip_connectionId header
     * that was inserted into the original message by the connection factory.
     */
    @MessagingGateway(defaultRequestChannel = "toTcp")
    public interface Gateway {
        void send(String message, @Header(IpHeaders.CONNECTION_ID) String connectionId);
    }

    @Bean
    public MessageChannel fromTcp() {
        return new DirectChannel();
    }

    @Bean
    public MessageChannel toTcp() {
        return new DirectChannel();
    }

    @Bean
    public AbstractServerConnectionFactory serverCF() {
        TcpNetServerConnectionFactory serverCf = new TcpNetServerConnectionFactory(socketPort);
        serverCf.setSerializer(SERIALIZER);
        serverCf.setDeserializer(SERIALIZER);
        serverCf.setSoTcpNoDelay(true);
        serverCf.setSoKeepAlive(true);
        // serverCf.setSingleUse(true);
        // final int soTimeout = 5000;
        // serverCf.setSoTimeout(soTimeout);
        return serverCf;
    }

    @Bean
    public AbstractClientConnectionFactory clientCF() {

        TcpNetClientConnectionFactory clientCf = new TcpNetClientConnectionFactory("localhost", socketPort);
        clientCf.setSerializer(SERIALIZER);
        clientCf.setDeserializer(SERIALIZER);
        clientCf.setSoTcpNoDelay(true);
        clientCf.setSoKeepAlive(true);
        // clientCf.setSingleUse(true);
        // final int soTimeout = 5000;
        // clientCf.setSoTimeout(soTimeout);
        return clientCf;
    }

    @Bean
    public TcpInboundGateway tcpInGate() {
        TcpInboundGateway inGate = new TcpInboundGateway();
        inGate.setConnectionFactory(serverCF());
        inGate.setRequestChannel(fromTcp());
        inGate.setReplyChannel(toTcp());
        return inGate;
    }

    @Bean
    public TcpOutboundGateway tcpOutGate() {
        TcpOutboundGateway outGate = new TcpOutboundGateway();
        outGate.setConnectionFactory(clientCF());
        outGate.setReplyChannel(toTcp());
        return outGate;
    }

This class contains a custom serializer and deserialiser

import lombok.extern.log4j.Log4j2;
import org.jetbrains.annotations.NotNull;
import org.springframework.core.serializer.Deserializer;
import org.springframework.core.serializer.Serializer;

import java.io.IOException;
import java.io.InputStream;
import java.io.OutputStream;

import java.nio.charset.StandardCharsets;

/**
* A custom serializer for incoming and/or outcoming messages.
*/
@Log4j2
public class CustomSerializerDeserializer implements Serializer<byte[]>, Deserializer<byte[]> {

    @NotNull
    @Override
    public byte[] deserialize(InputStream inputStream) throws IOException {
        byte[] message = new byte[0];
        if (inputStream.available() > 0) {
            message = inputStream.readAllBytes();
        }
        log.debug("Deserialized message {}", new String(message, StandardCharsets.UTF_8));
        return message;
    }

    @Override
    public void serialize(@NotNull byte[] message, OutputStream outputStream) throws IOException {
        log.info("Serializing {}", new String(message, StandardCharsets.UTF_8));
        outputStream.write(message);
        outputStream.flush();
    }
}

In the following classes you can implement some buisness logic to process incoming ...

import lombok.extern.log4j.Log4j2;
import org.springframework.integration.annotation.MessageEndpoint;
import org.springframework.integration.annotation.ServiceActivator;
import org.springframework.stereotype.Component;

@Log4j2
@Component
@MessageEndpoint
public class ClientSocketHandler {

    @ServiceActivator(inputChannel = "toTcp")
    public byte[] handleMessage(byte[] msg) {
        // TODO implement some buisiness logic here
        return msg;
    }
}

and outgoing messages.

import lombok.extern.log4j.Log4j2;
import org.springframework.integration.annotation.MessageEndpoint;
import org.springframework.integration.annotation.ServiceActivator;
import org.springframework.stereotype.Component;

@Log4j2
@Component
@MessageEndpoint
public class ClientSocketHandler {

    @ServiceActivator(inputChannel = "toTcp")
    public byte[] handleMessage(byte[] msg) {
        // implement some business logic here
        return msg;
    }
}

Hope it helps. ;-)

Answer 2

How are you communicating with this server? By default the connection factory is configured to require the input to be terminated by CRLF (e.g. Telnet). You have to configure a different deserializer if your client uses something else to indicate a message end.

Also, your method signature is incorrect; it should be:

public String handleMessage(byte[] message, MessageHeaders messageHeaders) {
    String string = new String(message);
    System.out.println(string);
    return string.toUpperCase();
}

This works fine for me with Telnet:

$ telnet localhost 1234
Trying ::1...
Connected to localhost.
Escape character is '^]'.
foo
FOO
^]
telnet> quit
Connection closed.

And here is a version that works with just LF (e.g. netcat):

@Bean
public IntegrationFlow server(ServerSocketHandler serverSocketHandler) {
    return IntegrationFlows.from(Tcp.inboundGateway(
            Tcp.netServer(1234)
                .deserializer(TcpCodecs.lf())
                .serializer(TcpCodecs.lf())))
            .handle(serverSocketHandler::handleMessage)
            .get();
}

$ nc localhost 1234
foo
FOO
^C