The following example show you how to create a servlet filter using the @WebFilter annotation. We will create a simple filter that will check whether an attribute is exists in the http session object. If no attribute found this filter will redirect user into a login page.

package org.kodejava.filter;

import javax.servlet.Filter;
import javax.servlet.FilterChain;
import javax.servlet.FilterConfig;
import javax.servlet.ServletException;
import javax.servlet.ServletRequest;
import javax.servlet.ServletResponse;
import javax.servlet.annotation.WebFilter;
import javax.servlet.http.HttpServletRequest;
import javax.servlet.http.HttpServletResponse;
import java.io.IOException;

@WebFilter(urlPatterns = "/*", description = "Session Checker Filter")
public class SessionCheckerFilter implements Filter {
    private FilterConfig config = null;

    public void init(FilterConfig config) throws ServletException {
        this.config = config;
        config.getServletContext().log("Initializing SessionCheckerFilter");
    }

    public void doFilter(ServletRequest req, ServletResponse res,
                         FilterChain chain)
            throws ServletException, IOException {

        HttpServletRequest request = (HttpServletRequest) req;
        HttpServletResponse response = (HttpServletResponse) res;

        //
        // Check to see if user's session attribute contains an attribute
        // named AUTHENTICATED. If the attribute is not exists redirect
        // user to the login page.
        //
        if (!request.getRequestURI().endsWith("login.jsp") &&
                request.getSession().getAttribute("AUTHENTICATED") == null) {
            response.sendRedirect(request.getContextPath() + "/login.jsp");
        }
        chain.doFilter(req, res);
    }

    public void destroy() {
        config.getServletContext().log("Destroying SessionCheckerFilter");
    }
}

Before the birth of @WebFilter annotation as defined in the Servlet 3.0 Specification. To make the filter functional we must register it in the web.xml file by using the filter and the filter-mapping element. And once it active it will collaborate with the other filters in the filter chain for the current servlet context.

Maven dependencies

<dependency>
    <groupId>javax.servlet</groupId>
    <artifactId>javax.servlet-api</artifactId>
    <version>4.0.1</version>
</dependency>