How to access a file under WEB-INF folder in java class

Question

I have a plain java class in a web application and want to read a configuration file under WEB-INF folder. I know the way to access the file if its in the class

Answer 1

hey you all care for context related file loading like application context , web.xml ,config and property file

Here is how to load a java file any kind of file under WEB-INF but it stored on another stucture like a sub folder reportFile the your file or sub folder again report01--

fullpath is = /WEB-INF/reportFile/report01/report.xml ,i have tried many possibilities to load and read this xml file ...none of the above worked for me but , here is the trick for future use...

In Action or inservice class you know interface implementation class no imports that is good part also.

declare your file object

File myClass = new File(getClass().getProtectionDomain().getCodeSource().getLocation().getFile());
System.out.println("Finding calss path first then remove classes from the path "    + myClass.getCanonicalPath().replaceFirst("classes", "")+"reportFIle/report01/reports.xml")

2.Load the path by removing classes from the above and add your specific path

File f = new File(myClass.getCanonicalPath().replaceFirst("classes", "")+"reportFile/report01/reports.xml")

Then

you can even parse it using xml parser or do anything

document = docBuilder.parse(new File(myClass.getCanonicalPath().replaceFirst("classes", "")+"reportFile/report01/reports.xml"));

Cheers!!

Answer 2

ServletContext.getResourceAsStream() will load a file from a given path relative to the root of the WAR file. Something like:

ServletContext ctx;
InputStream configStream = ctx.getResourceAsStream("/WEB-INF/config.properties");

The major issue here is that you need access to the servlet context to be able to do this. You have that in a servlet or a filter, but not in a non-web component further back in the application. You have a few options:

• Make the servlet context available from the web layer to the service layer, via an application-scoped variable, or injection, or some other way
• Put the resource-loading code in the web layer, and expose that to the service layer
• Load the configuration in the web layer, and pass it on to the service layer

Answer 3

"new FIleInputStream( Utility.class.getClassLoader().getResource(keyFileName).getPath() )" worked for me.

Here "Utility" is my class name where the code is calling this line , "keyFileName" is the file i need to open

Answer 4

You can get the absolute path of servlet using getRealPath() method of ServletContext and then append WEB-INF to the path you get. I think this is very basic there may be some other answers as well.