Configuration metadata annotation processor may use the wrong accessor for boolean properties

[mzeijen]

Spring Boot version: 2.3.5.RELEASE

The server.tomcat.use-relative-redirects property is incorrectly marked as deprecated in the spring-configuration-metadata.json of the spring-boot-autoconfiguration module

The problem is that the server.tomcat.use-relative-redirects is not deprecated, but only the Boolean typed getter and setter methods of the org.springframework.boot.autoconfigure.web.ServerProperties.Tomcat#useRelativeRedirects are deprecated (see the daed512 commit and the #20796 issue for the related changes). The addition of the @Deprecated to the Boolean getUseRelativeRedirects caused the deprecated to be set on true for the server.tomcat.use-relative-redirects entry in the spring-configuration-metadata.json of the spring-boot-autoconfiguration module.

The incorrect deprecation of this property now causes the properties migration listener to warn about the use of this property:

The use of configuration keys that are no longer supported was found in the environment:

Property source 'applicationConfig':
	Key: server.tomcat.use-relative-redirects
		Reason: none


Please refer to the release notes or reference guide for potential alternatives.

The Intellij application properties editor now also warns about setting this property.

[snicoll]

Good catch @mzeijen, we wanted to re-introduce the Boolean version in a deprecated fashion but unfortunately that triggered the annotation processor the way you indicated.

See #20796

[snicoll]

Unfortunately, we won't be able to "undo" the deprecation with manual metadata as things stand. Manual metadata is used to override the reason, replacement or level but not the fact the property is deprecated.

[mzeijen]

For now I created a workaround where I set the useRelativeRedirects directly on the Tomcat Context via a WebServerFactoryCustomizer<TomcatServletWebServerFactory>.
Luckily you made it possible to have multiple roads to Rome :).

It would be nice to be able to get rid of this workaround at some point, so I would appreciate some kind of fix. But if that can only happen in a next big release of Spring Boot, then so be it.

[snicoll]

I've repurposed this issue to fix a bug in the annotation processor where it may use the wrong accessor for a boolean type in case of multiple candidates, as in this case. The former Boolean accessor for the properties are deprecated and we should use the one matching the field type, really (boolean). Doing so will prevent the property to be wrongly identified as deprecated.