Passing multiple variables in @RequestBody to a Spring MVC controller using Ajax

You are correct, @RequestBody annotated parameter is expected to hold the entire body of the request and bind to one object, so you essentially will have to go with your options.

If you absolutely want your approach, there is a custom implementation that you can do though:

Say this is your json:

{
    "str1": "test one",
    "str2": "two test"
}

and you want to bind it to the two params here:

@RequestMapping(value = "/Test", method = RequestMethod.POST)
public boolean getTest(String str1, String str2)

First define a custom annotation, say @JsonArg, with the JSON path like path to the information that you want:

public boolean getTest(@JsonArg("/str1") String str1, @JsonArg("/str2") String str2)

Now write a Custom HandlerMethodArgumentResolver which uses the JsonPath defined above to resolve the actual argument:

import java.io.IOException;

import javax.servlet.http.HttpServletRequest;

import org.apache.commons.io.IOUtils;
import org.springframework.core.MethodParameter;
import org.springframework.http.server.ServletServerHttpRequest;
import org.springframework.web.bind.support.WebDataBinderFactory;
import org.springframework.web.context.request.NativeWebRequest;
import org.springframework.web.method.support.HandlerMethodArgumentResolver;
import org.springframework.web.method.support.ModelAndViewContainer;

import com.jayway.jsonpath.JsonPath;

public class JsonPathArgumentResolver implements HandlerMethodArgumentResolver{

    private static final String JSONBODYATTRIBUTE = "JSON_REQUEST_BODY";
    @Override
    public boolean supportsParameter(MethodParameter parameter) {
        return parameter.hasParameterAnnotation(JsonArg.class);
    }

    @Override
    public Object resolveArgument(MethodParameter parameter, ModelAndViewContainer mavContainer, NativeWebRequest webRequest, WebDataBinderFactory binderFactory) throws Exception {
        String body = getRequestBody(webRequest);
        String val = JsonPath.read(body, parameter.getMethodAnnotation(JsonArg.class).value());
        return val;
    }

    private String getRequestBody(NativeWebRequest webRequest){
        HttpServletRequest servletRequest = webRequest.getNativeRequest(HttpServletRequest.class);
        String jsonBody = (String) servletRequest.getAttribute(JSONBODYATTRIBUTE);
        if (jsonBody==null){
            try {
                String body = IOUtils.toString(servletRequest.getInputStream());
                servletRequest.setAttribute(JSONBODYATTRIBUTE, body);
                return body;
            } catch (IOException e) {
                throw new RuntimeException(e);
            }
        }
        return "";

    }
}

Now just register this with Spring MVC. A bit involved, but this should work cleanly.

For passing multiple object, params, variable and so on. You can do it dynamically using ObjectNode from jackson library as your param. You can do it like this way:

@RequestMapping(value = "/Test", method = RequestMethod.POST)
@ResponseBody
public boolean getTest(@RequestBody ObjectNode objectNode) {
   // And then you can call parameters from objectNode
   String strOne = objectNode.get("str1").asText();
   String strTwo = objectNode.get("str2").asText();

   // When you using ObjectNode, you can pas other data such as:
   // instance object, array list, nested object, etc.
}

I hope this help.

While it's true that @RequestBody must map to a single object, that object can be a Map, so this gets you a good way to what you are attempting to achieve (no need to write a one off backing object):

@RequestMapping(value = "/Test", method = RequestMethod.POST)
@ResponseBody
public boolean getTest(@RequestBody Map<String, String> json) {
   //json.get("str1") == "test one"
}

You can also bind to Jackson's ObjectNode if you want a full JSON tree:

public boolean getTest(@RequestBody ObjectNode json) {
   //json.get("str1").asText() == "test one"