Document global servlet path matcher configuration

Contribution Overview

The Engineering Context

This contribution was made to the spring-projects/spring-securityopen-source repository. The work involved understanding the existing codebase, identifying the underlying engineering problem, implementing a focused solution, and validating the change against the project's existing behaviour and testing standards.

Original Issue

Clarify servlet path handling when configuring Spring Security request matchers.

Applications using a shared servlet path needed clearer guidance for configuring request matchers consistently across string-based authorization rules.

Engineering Problem

Understanding the Problem

The Spring Security migration documentation demonstrated an explicit basePath approach but did not document a reusable global PathPatternRequestMatcher.Builder configuration for applications where most authorization rules share the same servlet path.

Solution

Implementation Approach

Updated the Spring Security 7 migration guide with a global PathPatternRequestMatcher.Builder example using PathPatternRequestMatcher and DispatcherServletPath, allowing the configured servlet path to be applied consistently when building request matchers from string-based authorization methods.

Technologies

Engineering Stack