What is the correct META-INF directory location for context.xml in Tomcat?

Question

Should a "context.xml" file for deploying application-specific configuration to Tomcat be placed in:

src/main/resources/META-INF/context.xml

...or...

src/main/webapp/META-INF/context.xml ?

Justification for asking: Have seen conflicting advice on StackOverflow and could not find the specific location mentioned in the Tomcat documentation.

Acme

I think WebContent/META-INF/context.xml is the right place – Reorientation

Answer 1

The documentation is indeed not specific about this.

It is src/main/webapp/META-INF since the file needs to end up deployed in the web root/META-INF folder, not in WEB-INF/classes/META-INF.

Boughton

Thanks, do you have a link to back this up? Interestingly, persistence.xml should be deployed there according to this link: "If you package the persistence unit as a set of classes in a WAR file, persistence.xml should be located in the WAR file’s WEB-INF/classes/META-INF directory." If what you said is true, I guess this would imply a need for more than one META-INF location. – Acme

Nothing interesting about it. persistence.xml is something entirely different and needs to be on the classpath (you can also use it in standard client applications). No I don't have a link to back it up since the official documentation doesn't explicitly state it. You can try it out yourself right now to confirm it. – Boughton

OK, maybe "interesting" was the wrong word :-) But I'd assumed there would be only one META-INF folder in a web application - seems this was wrong. – Acme

Ah, just found a similar question and someone who backs up what you said here - answer accepted. – Acme