Understanding IoC and Spring [jroller.com]
A detailed explanation about IoC from kdonald blog on jroller
Inversion of Control ([IoC]) is a programming design pattern that specifies a layer of abstraction between components.
Components link together through public interfaces in a plug-in architecture, they are then stitched together in a factory. Because the control over object instantiation and linking is external, this is termed ‘Inversion of Control’
A detailed explanation about IoC from kdonald blog on jroller
Martin Fowler explains what an inversion of control container is, the 3 types of inversion of control, and how to use them (with code samples).
“Spring is not the only lightweight container available. In the last few years, more and more Java developers have been seeking an alternative to EJB. As a result, several lightweight containers have been developed with different methods for achieving inversion of control.” This article discusses PicoContainer, Avalon, Hivemind and also compares the framework aspects of Spring with Struts.
"Within the web world, you won't find too many web applications that aren't built on top of the likes of Model View Controller, Business Delegate, Session Facade, Data Access Object, or other patterns these days. These patterns have been used to form architectures that attempt to provide a stronger foundation for our applications. By utilizing some of these patterns together, we avoid the problems faced by past development efforts, and provide extensibility for future growth. However, one problem still remains: component dependency resolution. In this article, we will take a look at the problem in more depth and learn how others have tried to solve the problem by utilizing frameworks that implement the Inversion of Control (or IoC) pattern. First, we'll become familiar with some terms, the IoC pattern, and other patterns that have tried to implement a solution (but didn't completely succeed). Then we'll move on, to see how two of the most popular IoC frameworks are used today. These frameworks are PicoContainer and HiveMind. "