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Configure Tomcat to serve static files directly from filesystem [message #803820]

Tue, 21 February 2012 16:33

Eclipse User

Hello Virgo users

This is a follow-up to this message on the tomcat users mailing list.

I'm trying to configure Tomcat to serve files directly from the filesystem.
I basically want to use this configuration:

<Context docBase="D:/Downloads/dojo-release-1.7.1-src" path="/dojo/1.7.1" />

This should make e.g. the file D:/Downloads/dojo-release-1.7.1-src/dojo/dojo.js available as http://localhost:8080/dojo/1.7.1/dojo/dojo.js

I tried several approaches which all did not work out:

Put the <Context ...> element in the <Host> entry for localhost in $VIRGO_SERVER$/config/tomcat-server.xml
Put the <Context ...> element in its on file in $VIRGO_SERVER$/config/Catalina/localhost/context.xml
Put the <Context ...> element in its on file in $VIRGO_SERVER$/config/Catalina/localhost/dojo.xml

Any idea how this can be achieved?

Best regards,
James

Re: Configure Tomcat to serve static files directly from filesystem [message #804333 is a reply to message #803820]

Wed, 22 February 2012 08:50

Eclipse User

Hi,

You have two approaches that you can use depending on what exactly you need:

1. You can use Tomcat's aliases functionality (http://tomcat.apache.org/tomcat-7.0-doc/config/context.html#Standard_Implementation)

You need to deploy an "empty" web application that only describes in the Manifest which is the context-path (as this is the standard way for OSGi), and in the context.xml - aliases mapping (mapping to an external directory) - see attached example. Just copy the example in pickup folder.

In Virgo we do not support deployment via context.xml, also we recommend to provide context.xml via archive and not in <Virgo-Home>config/Catalina/localhost/<context-path>.xml because in OSGi it is allowed to have more than one web application bundles with one and the same context path installed on the system.

2. The second approach is with watched repository:
2.1. In <Virgo-Home>/config/org.eclipse.virgo.repository.properties specify:

my.type=watched
my.watchDirectory=C:/Downloads/watched_repo

chain=ext,usr,my

2.2. Under "C:/Downloads/watched_repo" extract the attached example.
2.3. Create folder "C:/Downloads/watched_repo/aliases/dojo" and put there your static files.
2.4. Create a plan and copy it in pickup folder.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<plan name="my.plan" version="1.0.0" scoped="false" atomic="true"
        xmlns="http://www.eclipse.org/virgo/schema/plan"
	xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
	xsi:schemaLocation="
	        http://www.eclipse.org/virgo/schema/plan 
	        http://www.eclipse.org/virgo/schema/plan/eclipse-virgo-plan.xsd">

	<artifact type="bundle" name="dojo.1.7.1" version="1.0.0"/>
	
</plan>

In both cases you should be able to request http://localhost:8080/dojo/1.7.1/dojo/index.html (index.html for example)

Please let me know whether these approaches will work for your use case.

Regards
Violeta