+1 on the "Why should I use Spring" and "beat me over the head until I use it" statement.
The Spring framework is a lot of things, and I'm not even interested in using most of them at all. However, I find that the base framework provides a nice way to prepare an application context.
For a long time, I used Digester to read an XML file and use it to create one or more specialist classes that encapsulated business logic and DAO type behavior, and then I just had my Struts actions know where to look for those classes in the ServletContext.
Digester is still useful for this, but the Spring XmlBeanFactory achieves similar results and yet allows me to potentially link together some of the specialist classes a little more flexibly. Digester is very useful for a tree structure, but doesn't do as well when you want to refer to one element in two or more places. Spring's XmlBeanFactory lets you set properties by reference, which is proving to be more flexible for us.
This may be a little abstract to serve as a "beat you over the head until you use it" explanation, but in short, I'm pretty happy with it so far.
Spring also provides DAO abstraction, transaction management, and aspect-oriented development features, but you can leave all those behind if you don't need them. Oh yeah, it also has an MVC web controller piece!
Joe
--
Joe Germuska [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://blog.germuska.com "In fact, when I die, if I don't hear 'A Love Supreme,' I'll turn back; I'll know I'm in the wrong place."
- Carlos Santana
