https-springboot-react

The goal of this project is to play with HTTPS and enable it in Spring Boot applications. For it, we will implement a Spring Boot REST API, called movies-api that will have its endpoints ready to accept and server over HTTPS. Furthermore, a Spring Boot Shell Java application, called movies-shell, and a Frontend React application, called movies-ui, will be implemented to consume movies-api.

Proof-of-Concepts & Articles

On ivangfr.github.io, I have compiled my Proof-of-Concepts (PoCs) and articles. You can easily search for the technology you are interested in by using the filter. Who knows, perhaps I have already implemented a PoC or written an article about what you are looking for.

Applications

• movies-api

  Spring Boot Web Java application that exposes a REST API to manage movies. Its endpoints are ready to accept and server over HTTPS. movies-api stores its data in H2 memory database.

• movies-shell

  Spring Boot Shell Java application that uses movies-api to get information about a movie or to even add/delete a movie. All the communication with movies-api is over HTTPS.

• movies-ui

  React frontend application where users can manage movies. All the communication with movies-api is over HTTPS. It uses Semantic UI React as CSS-styled framework.

Prerequisites

• npm
• Java 17+

Start applications

• movies-api

  • Open a terminal and, inside https-springboot-react/movies-api folder, run the command bellow

    ./mvnw clean spring-boot:run
    

  • Access Swagger website at https://localhost:8443/swagger-ui.html

  • Once accessed for the first time, the following page will appear

    

  • Click Advanced > Proceed to localhost (unsafe)

    Now, you should see

    

  • To re-enable the security warning saying Your connection is not private for https://localhost:8443/swagger-ui.html, click Not Secure (in the address bar) > Re-enable warnings

• movies-shell

  • Open a new terminal and navigate to https-springboot-react/movies-shell folder

  • Run the command below to package the jar

    ./mvnw clean package -DskipTests
    

  • Run the following command to start movies-shell

    ./target/movies-shell-0.0.1-SNAPSHOT.jar
    

  • Sample of the shell interface and execution

    

• movies-ui

  • Open a new terminal and navigate to https-springboot-react/movies-ui folder

  • Execute the command below if you are running it for the first time

    npm install
    

  • To start movies-ui run

    npm start
    

  • Access https://localhost:3443

  • Once accessed for the first time, the following page will appear

    

  • Click Advanced > Proceed to localhost (unsafe)

    Now, you shoud see

    

    Note: In case movies-ui cannot communicate with movies-api

    • Open movies-api Swagger website: https://localhost:8443/swagger-ui.html
    • Click Advanced > Proceed to localhost (unsafe)
    • Reload movies-ui page

  • To re-enable the security warning saying Your connection is not private for https://localhost:3443, click Not Secure (in the address bar) > Re-enable warnings

Shutdown

To stop movies-api, movies-ui and movies-shell, go to the terminal where they are running and press Ctrl+C

Create PKCS12 self-signed certificate

• In order to create a PKCS12 certificate, run the following command

  keytool -genkeypair -alias localhost \
    -keyalg RSA -keysize 2048 -storetype PKCS12 \
    -keystore keystore.p12 -validity 3650 \
    -dname "CN=localhost, OU=MyCompany, O=MyCompany, L=Berlin, ST=Berlin, C=DE"
  

• Set a password. In this project, we will use secret

  Enter keystore password: secret
  Re-enter new password: secret
  

• To list the certificates keystore.p12 run the command below. The password will be requested.

  keytool -list -v -keystore keystore.p12
  

How to upgrade movies-ui dependencies to latest version

• In a terminal, make sure you are inside https-springboot-react/movies-ui folder

• Run the following commands

  npm upgrade
  npm i -g npm-check-updates
  ncu -u
  npm install
  

References

• https://www.javadevjournal.com/spring-boot/spring-boot-ssl/
• https://www.baeldung.com/spring-boot-https-self-signed-certificate
• https://www.thomasvitale.com/https-spring-boot-ssl-certificate/
• https://medium.com/@danielgwilson/https-and-create-react-app-3a30ed31c904