Loading a configuration file from the classpath

Question

I\'m working on making my Java app easy to deploy to other computers and am writing an ant script to do so, that is going fine.

I\'m having trouble loading resources

Answer 1

You can use the log4j.configuration system property when you startup your application:

java -Dlog4j.configuration=config/log4j.properties MyApp

See http://logging.apache.org/log4j/1.2/manual.html under "Default Initialization Procedure".

Regarding the other configuration files not being picked up, what does your Manifest.mf file looks like? Are you using something like

Class-Path: config/configuration.xml lib/yourLibOne.jar lib/blah.jar

in your Manifest.mf file?

Answer 2

Regarding log4j : If you want it to use a different config file from the default, you can use

org.apache.log4j.PropertyConfigurator.configure(...)

Variants of this static method accept URL, Properties or file name.

There is also

org.apache.log4j.xml.DOMConfigurator

for the XML files.

Answer 3

As far as I know, log4j.xml should be at root of your classpath..

and also, you can read your configuration file with below code script. and config directory should be at your classpath.

this.xml = this.getClass().getResourceAsStream("/config/configuration.xml"); 

Answer 4

Classpath entries should either be directories or jar files, not individual files. Try changing your classpath to point to the config directory instead of the individual config files.

this.xml = Thread.currentThread().getContextClassLoader()
             .getResourceAsStream("config.xml");

Better yet would be to just include your config directory in MyProgram.jar. This would prevent you from needing to add it specifically to the classpath.

this.xml = Thread.currentThread().getContextClassLoader()
             .getResourceAsStream("/config/configuration.xml");