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Hi

I keep having problems with file paths in java. Every time I have to
make a file available, mostly a config file of some sort, to the
application I keep having problems specifying the correct path to the
file. There seems to be many different syntaxes for doing this and I
dont understand fully which do what and how.

I have tried to find some information about this on the net, but have
not been able to find something that fully explains this.

Here are some specific examples of paths issues I have.

log4j
spring
java properties files

The question is: where do I put the config file and how do I specify the
path to where the config file is to be found? I have noticed that some
use the "classpath:" to specify a config file that is to be found
somewhere in the classpaths, I have also noticed that some require the
config file to be in the same directory as the class resides in.
I have not figured out how to specify a path to a file outside the
classpath dorectoru paths, eg. in a separate conf/ directory.

Some help or guidance is much appreciacted, thanks

tom

Tom Forsmo wrote:
> Hi
>
> I keep having problems with file paths in java. Every time I have to
> make a file available, mostly a config file of some sort, to the
> application I keep having problems specifying the correct path to the
> file. There seems to be many different syntaxes for doing this and I
> dont understand fully which do what and how.
>
> I have tried to find some information about this on the net, but have
> not been able to find something that fully explains this.
>
> Here are some specific examples of paths issues I have.
>
> log4j
> spring
> java properties files
>
> The question is: where do I put the config file and how do I specify the
> path to where the config file is to be found? I have noticed that some
> use the "classpath:" to specify a config file that is to be found
> somewhere in the classpaths, I have also noticed that some require the
> config file to be in the same directory as the class resides in.
> I have not figured out how to specify a path to a file outside the
> classpath dorectoru paths, eg. in a separate conf/ directory.
>
> Some help or guidance is much appreciacted, thanks
>
> tom

I don't know anything about log4j or spring but the Java Properties
class loads it's data from an InputStream. An InputStream can be
created easily from a File and several other sources. File syntax and
methods are pretty straight forward. The description of abstract
pathnames in the docs for File is where you need to look. Also write
your self a program to list out the System Properties. There you will
find many useful properties for creating abstract pathnames such as;

file.separator
path.separator
user.dir
user.home
java.home

--

Knute Johnson
email s/nospam/knute/

Knute Johnson wrote:
> I don't know anything about log4j or spring but the Java Properties
> class loads it's data from an InputStream. An InputStream can be
> created easily from a File and several other sources. File syntax and
> methods are pretty straight forward. The description of abstract
> pathnames in the docs for File is where you need to look. Also write
> your self a program to list out the System Properties. There you will
> find many useful properties for creating abstract pathnames such as;
>
> file.separator
> path.separator
> user.dir
> user.home
> java.home

Some of which are completely irrelevant in a web application.

<http://java.sun.com/javase/6/docs/api/java/lang/ClassLoader.html#getResourceAsStream(java.lang.Str ing)>
gets a resource relative to the first classpath element that has it.

<http://java.sun.com/javase/6/docs/api/java/util/Properties.html#load(java.io.InputStream)>
and its variants do the same.

<http://java.sun.com/j2ee/1.4/docs/api/javax/servlet/ServletContext.html#getResourceAsStream(java.lang. String)>
in conjunction with
<http://java.sun.com/j2ee/1.4/docs/api/javax/servlet/ServletContext.html#getRealPath(java.lang.String)>
gets a resource relative to the web-app context.

<http://java.sun.com/javase/6/docs/api/java/net/URL.html#URL(java.lang.String)>
and its get...() methods like
<http://java.sun.com/javase/6/docs/ap...ava.lang.Class[])>
and related methods such as
<http://java.sun.com/javase/6/docs/ap...ava.lang.Class[])>
get resources via their URLs.

--
Lew