Configuring Spring Boot DevTools in IntelliJ

IntelliJ is my favorite IDE, but when I started developing SpringBoot applications in it, I was struggling with the constant restarts that I had to do after some change on the code. Even after adding the Spring Boot DevTools, as shown below:

<dependency>
 <groupId>org.springframework.boot</groupId>
 <artifactId>spring-boot-devtools</artifactId>
 <scope>runtime</scope>
</dependency>

Then after some research I’ve got the solution. In this article I will describe the steps to enable DevTools on IntelliJ and make your life easier while developing Spring Boot applications.

1. Go to Help > Find Action… (or press Ctrl-Alt-Shift-/ on Windows or Cmd-Shift-A on MacOs)
2. Type reg, then selecte “Registry” from the menu that appears (as shown below)

Select the checkbox on property compiler.automake.allow.when.app.running (as shown below)

Remember that you shoud also add Spring DevTools as a dependency. This module provides the following features:

• Property Defaults
• Automatic Restart
• LiveReload
• Remote Debug Tunneling
• Remote Update and Restart

For more details about each functionality, please visit here.