Running the Code
To run the code in this article, you'll need to download a distribution of Spring web services. As I'm writing this article, the latest version is 1.5.3. Download a copy of the distribution and unzip it to a folder of your choice. Included with this article is a source.zip file containing the files you'll need. Assuming that you have Maven and Tomcat installed, you should be able to build the code using the application context.
Here's a good exercise to try: Add your own class to the application context and then load an instance of that class via the BeanFactory. This will help convince you that the mechanism actually works!