Problems deploying GWT app in Tomcat

[Jostein]

Hi

I have developed an application in dev mode in Eclipe for some time and everything workes fine. Yesterday I tried to deploy to Tomcat, but the application did not launch in the browser. 

Then I tried the same with a basic Web Application Starter Project, generated automatically when creating a new GWT project i Eclipse. The new project consists of some basic functionality, RPC included.

The deploying process goes like this (this is my understandig of how to do it)

1. Perform "GWT Compile Project" from the blue "g" dropdown in the toolbar in Eclipse

2. Use default settings in the "GWT compile" dialog. Press "Compile".

3. After comiling I select the .war folder in the TestTomcat project in Eclipse.

4. Then rightclick ->  Export -> Archive file -> Next

5. Change the "To archive file" to "D:\apache-tomcat-7.0.34\webapps\TestTomcat.war.zip" -> Finish

6. Opens the D:\apache-tomcat-7.0.34\webapps folder and renames the "TestTomcat.war.zip" to "TestTomcat.war"

7. Then I restart Tomcat and now a new folder "TestTomcat" has been created in the webapps folder

I run my app in a browser with this url:

http://localhost/TestTomcat/TestTomcat/war/TestTomcat.html

The application starts as expected, but when I press the "Send" button that is sending a name to the server I get an error message

"An error occurred while attempting to contact the server. Please check your network connection and try again."

My JAVA_HOME=C:\Program Files\Java\jdk1.7.0_09

a) Why doesn't RPC work?

b) Is this the correct way to deploy GWT application in Tomcat?

Any help is appreciated.

Thanks

Jostein

[Thomas Broyer]

The fact your host page is at "TestTomcat/TestTomcat/war/TestTomcat.html" should ring a bell. It should probably be at "TestTomcat/TestTomcat.html" instead, which means your *.war isn't packaged correctly. The WEB-INF/ folder should be at the root of the WAR, alongside the TestTomcat.html.

 

b) Is this the correct way to deploy GWT application in Tomcat?

Probably not. Any "correct" way in my book would involve a build script (Ant, Maven, Gradle, or even Make or a shell/batch script) to package the app.

Dropping the WAR into Tomcat's webapps dir and restarting Tomcat is OK though; see http://tomcat.apache.org/tomcat-7.0-doc/appdev/deployment.html#Deployment_With_Tomcat (read through the whole tutorial, a GWT is no different, just that the javascript is generated from Java code by an additional build step)

[Lukasz Plotnicki]

As Thomas already stated, the best way would be to use a proper build system. I use maven and maven-gwt-plugin which works just perfectly. 

But if you don't have any spare time to switch to maven right now, you will get your app running performing your step 1 & 2 and then putting everything in the war directory of your project into an war archive which can be easly deployed on tomcat.

HTH,

Lukasz

[Jostein]

Hi

Thank you for quick answers. I have been searching a bit more today and I found a link to a plugin for Eclipse that solves this issue in one operation.

http://code.google.com/p/gwt-project-export-wizard/

After installing the plugin I got a new menu item in the gogle menu "GWT Web app export..." that compiles to a war file in a selected destination folder. I selected Tomcat webapp folder as destination for my TestTomcat app and this time the war structure is correct. The url http://locahost/TestTomcat/TestTomcat.html starts the applicatiuon and this tome the server replies as expected.

So, I am a step futher now.

Hovewer, I have an issue with my other application. It compiles correctly in Eclipse (Compilation secceeded..), but it fails to be installed in Tomcat. Error mesage, cut from the log:

SEVERE: Error deploying web application archive D:\apache-tomcat-7.0.34\webapps\Betelo2.war

java.lang.IllegalStateException: ContainerBase.addChild: start: org.apache.catalina.LifecycleException: Failed to start component [StandardEngine[Catalina].StandardHost[localhost].StandardContext[/Betelo2]]

I guess this is a tomcat issue and should be addressed in an other forum (??) but if any of you can shed light on this issue I am very grateful.

Regards,

Jostein

[Jens]

Hovewer, I have an issue with my other application. It compiles correctly in Eclipse (Compilation secceeded..), but it fails to be installed in Tomcat. Error mesage, cut from the log:

SEVERE: Error deploying web application archive D:\apache-tomcat-7.0.34\webapps\Betelo2.war

java.lang.IllegalStateException: ContainerBase.addChild: start: org.apache.catalina.LifecycleException: Failed to start component [StandardEngine[Catalina].StandardHost[localhost].StandardContext[/Betelo2]]

No additional information available? The log above does not give any hints about what could be wrong. Maybe you have two webapps with the same context path /Betelo2 in your tomcat folder?

-- J.

[Adolfo Rodriguez]

do not make a war file, just copy your war directory and paste it as an app in Tomcat's webapps folder

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De: Lukasz Plotnicki <l.plo...@gmail.com>
Para: google-we...@googlegroups.com
Enviado: Miércoles 23 de enero de 2013 15:23
Asunto: Re: Problems deploying GWT app in Tomcat

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[Jostein]

Here is an snippet from the Tomcat log that probably explains the problem.

Caused by: java.lang.IllegalArgumentException: Invalid <url-pattern> betelo2/commondata in servlet mapping

at org.apache.catalina.core.StandardContext.addServletMapping(StandardContext.java:3217)

at org.apache.catalina.core.StandardContext.addServletMapping(StandardContext.java:3192)

at org.apache.catalina.deploy.WebXml.configureContext(WebXml.java:1304)

at org.apache.catalina.startup.ContextConfig.webConfig(ContextConfig.java:1352)

at org.apache.catalina.startup.ContextConfig.configureStart(ContextConfig.java:878)

...

As a said. Everething works fine in dev mode, but I get this error when deploying to Tomcat

and here is a snippet from my web.xml

 <!-- Servlets -->

  <servlet>

    <servlet-name>loginServlet</servlet-name>

    <servlet-class>com.fdv.betelo2.server.LoginServiceImpl</servlet-class>

  </servlet>

  <servlet>

    <servlet-name>commonDataServlet</servlet-name>

    <servlet-class>com.fdv.betelo2.server.CommonDataServiceImpl</servlet-class>

  </servlet>

  <servlet-mapping>

    <servlet-name>loginServlet</servlet-name>

    <url-pattern>betelo2/login</url-pattern>

  </servlet-mapping>

  <servlet-mapping>

    <servlet-name>commonDataServlet</servlet-name>

    <url-pattern>betelo2/commondata</url-pattern>

  </servlet-mapping>

I cannot see what is wrong here. I am grateful for any help.

Regards, 

Jostein

kl. 11:52:30 UTC+1 onsdag 23. januar 2013 skrev Jostein følgende:

[Lukasz Plotnicki]

Should it not be: 

 <servlet-mapping>

    <servlet-name>loginServlet</servlet-name>

    <url-pattern>/betelo2/login</url-pattern>

  </servlet-mapping>

  <servlet-mapping>

    <servlet-name>commonDataServlet</servlet-name>

    <url-pattern>/betelo2/commondata</url-pattern>

  </servlet-mapping>

HTH,

Lukasz