ScopeNotActiveException with @StepScope ItemProcessor in Multi-threaded ChunkOrientedStep

[KILL9-NO-MERCY]

Hello Spring Batch Team,

I am reporting an issue regarding the new ChunkOrientedStep introduced in version 6.0. It appears that when a step is configured as multi-threaded, an ItemProcessor defined with @StepScope fails to resolve correctly within the worker threads.

Bug Description

In the ChunkOrientedStep implementation, specifically when using processChunkConcurrently, the StepContext does not seem to be propagated to the worker threads managed by the TaskExecutor.

As a result, when the worker thread attempts to invoke the ItemProcessor (which is a @StepScope proxy), it throws a ScopeNotActiveException because the StepSynchronizationManager on that specific thread has no active context.

Environment

Spring Batch version: v6
Step Implementation: ChunkOrientedStep
Configuration: TaskExecutor (e.g., SimpleAsyncTaskExecutor) + @StepScope ItemProcessor

Reproducible Configuration

@Bean
public Step issueReproductionStep(
        JobRepository jobRepository,
        ItemReader<TestItem> reader,
        ItemProcessor<TestItem, TestItem> itemProcessor, // @StepScope Bean
        ItemWriter<TestItem> writer
) {
    return new StepBuilder(jobRepository)
            .<TestItem, TestItem>chunk(1)
            .reader(reader)
            .processor(itemProcessor)
            .writer(writer)
            .taskExecutor(new SimpleAsyncTaskExecutor()) // Multi-threading enabled
            .build();
}

@Bean
@StepScope
public ItemProcessor<TestItem, TestItem> issueReproductionProcessor() {
    return item -> {
        log.info("[Thread: {}] Processing item: {}", Thread.currentThread().getName(), item.getName());
        return item;
    };
}

Actual Result (Stacktrace)

The error occurs when the worker thread tries to access the scoped ItemProcessor:

Caused by: org.springframework.beans.factory.support.ScopeNotActiveException: Error creating bean with name 'scopedTarget.issueReproductionProcessor': Scope 'step' is not active for the current thread
    at org.springframework.beans.factory.support.AbstractBeanFactory.doGetBean(AbstractBeanFactory.java:381)
    ...
    at jdk.proxy2/jdk.proxy2.$Proxy134.process(Unknown Source)
    at org.springframework.batch.core.step.item.ChunkOrientedStep.doProcess(ChunkOrientedStep.java:655)
    ...
Caused by: java.lang.IllegalStateException: No context holder available for step scope
    at org.springframework.batch.core.scope.StepScope.getContext(StepScope.java:167)

Expected Behavior

I am not certain whether this is an intended architectural change or an oversight in the new implementation. However, if this is a bug, the @StepScope ItemProcessor should function correctly within worker threads, as it did in previous versions.

Proposed change in ChunkOrientedStep.processChunkConcurrently:

// Inside processChunkConcurrently method
Future<O> itemProcessingFuture = this.taskExecutor.submit(() -> {
    try {
        // Register step execution to the current worker thread's StepSynchronizationManager
        StepSynchronizationManager.register(stepExecution);
        return processItem(item, contribution);
    } finally {
        // Clear the context after processing to prevent memory leaks
        StepSynchronizationManager.close();
    }
});

Thanks for your time and for maintaining this project! Please let me know if you need any further information or a working reproduction repository!

[LeeHyungGeol]

Hello @fmbenhassine.

Would it be okay if i give it a try on this issue?