Not able to read config.properties using Commons Configuration in a maven web project - maven

Question

I'm trying to read config.properties file placed in src/main/resources folder for my maven web project, using Commons-configuration api. I'm able to use it without any issues for a normal maven project but in web project this somehow doesn't work. Here is my pom.xml
<project xmlns="http://maven.apache.org/POM/4.0.0" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
xsi:schemaLocation="http://maven.apache.org/POM/4.0.0 http://maven.apache.org/maven-v4_0_0.xsd">
<modelVersion>4.0.0</modelVersion>
<groupId>edu.uta.cse</groupId>
<artifactId>SpringSecurity</artifactId>
<packaging>war</packaging>
<version>0.0.1-SNAPSHOT</version>
<name>CraiglistWebApp</name>
<url>http://maven.apache.org</url>
<properties>
<jdk.version>1.7</jdk.version>
<spring.version>4.1.1.RELEASE</spring.version>
<jstl.version>1.2</jstl.version>
<junit.version>4.11</junit.version>
<logback.version>1.0.13</logback.version>
<spring.security.version>3.2.3.RELEASE</spring.security.version>
<jcl-over-slf4j.version>1.7.5</jcl-over-slf4j.version>
</properties>
<dependencies>
<dependency>
<groupId>com.amazonaws</groupId>
<artifactId>aws-java-sdk</artifactId>
<version>1.9.20.1</version>
</dependency>
<dependency>
<groupId>junit</groupId>
<artifactId>junit</artifactId>
<version>3.8.1</version>
<scope>test</scope>
</dependency>
<!-- Spring Core -->
<dependency>
<groupId>org.springframework</groupId>
<artifactId>spring-core</artifactId>
<version>${spring.version}</version>
<exclusions>
<exclusion>
<groupId>commons-logging</groupId>
<artifactId>commons-logging</artifactId>
</exclusion>
</exclusions>
</dependency>
<dependency>
<groupId>org.slf4j</groupId>
<artifactId>jcl-over-slf4j</artifactId>
<version>${jcl-over-slf4j.version}</version>
</dependency>
<dependency>
<groupId>ch.qos.logback</groupId>
<artifactId>logback-classic</artifactId>
<version>${logback.version}</version>
</dependency>
<dependency>
<groupId>org.springframework</groupId>
<artifactId>spring-web</artifactId>
<version>${spring.version}</version>
</dependency>
<dependency>
<groupId>org.springframework</groupId>
<artifactId>spring-webmvc</artifactId>
<version>${spring.version}</version>
</dependency>
<dependency>
<groupId>commons-configuration</groupId>
<artifactId>commons-configuration</artifactId>
<version>1.6</version>
</dependency>
<dependency>
<groupId>com.fasterxml.jackson.core</groupId>
<artifactId>jackson-databind</artifactId>
<version>2.5.1</version>
</dependency>
<dependency>
<groupId>com.fasterxml.jackson.core</groupId>
<artifactId>jackson-core</artifactId>
<version>2.5.1</version>
</dependency>
<dependency>
<groupId>com.fasterxml.jackson.core</groupId>
<artifactId>jackson-annotations</artifactId>
<version>2.5.1</version>
</dependency>
<dependency>
<groupId>commons-fileupload</groupId>
<artifactId>commons-fileupload</artifactId>
<version>1.3</version>
</dependency>
<dependency>
<groupId>commons-beanutils</groupId>
<artifactId>commons-beanutils</artifactId>
<version>1.9.2</version>
</dependency>
<dependency>
<groupId>commons-collections</groupId>
<artifactId>commons-collections</artifactId>
<version>3.2.1</version>
<!-- <optional>true</optional> -->
</dependency>
<!-- Spring Security -->
<dependency>
<groupId>org.springframework.security</groupId>
<artifactId>spring-security-web</artifactId>
<version>${spring.security.version}</version>
</dependency>
<dependency>
<groupId>org.springframework.security</groupId>
<artifactId>spring-security-config</artifactId>
<version>${spring.security.version}</version>
</dependency>
<!-- jstl -->
<dependency>
<groupId>jstl</groupId>
<artifactId>jstl</artifactId>
<version>${jstl.version}</version>
</dependency>
</dependencies>
<build>
<finalName>CraiglistWebApp</finalName>
<plugins>
<!-- Eclipse project -->
<plugin>
<groupId>org.apache.maven.plugins</groupId>
<artifactId>maven-eclipse-plugin</artifactId>
<version>2.9</version>
<configuration>
<!-- Always download and attach dependencies source code -->
<downloadSources>true</downloadSources>
<downloadJavadocs>false</downloadJavadocs>
<!-- Avoid type mvn eclipse:eclipse -Dwtpversion=2.0 -->
<wtpversion>2.0</wtpversion>
</configuration>
</plugin>
<!-- Set JDK Compiler Level -->
<plugin>
<groupId>org.apache.maven.plugins</groupId>
<artifactId>maven-compiler-plugin</artifactId>
<version>2.3.2</version>
<configuration>
<source>${jdk.version}</source>
<target>${jdk.version}</target>
</configuration>
</plugin>
<!-- For Maven Tomcat Plugin -->
<plugin>
<groupId>org.apache.tomcat.maven</groupId>
<artifactId>tomcat7-maven-plugin</artifactId>
<version>2.2</version>
<configuration>
<path>/CraiglistWebApp</path>
</configuration>
</plugin>
</plugins>
<resources>
<resource>
<directory>src/main/resources</directory>
<!-- <filtering>true</filtering> -->
</resource>
</resources>
</build>
and I'm reading this file using the below code
static {
Configuration config = null;
try {
//config = new PropertiesConfiguration("resources/config.properties"); this package is placed in src/main/java and using this it works perfectly fine
config = new PropertiesConfiguration("src/main/resources/config.properties"); // this doesn't seem to work
} catch (ConfigurationException e) {
e.printStackTrace();
}
UPLOAD_LOCATION = config.getString("image.upload.location");
TABLE_NAME = config.getString("table.name");}
Have I missed anything in pom.xml. Please help!

Answer 1

When you create an instance of the PropertiesConfiguration object, it will search the current classpath for the file you specify. With a Maven web project, the src/main/resources folder should already be included on the classpath, so there is no need to precede your file name with the directory. In other words, this should work:
config = new PropertiesConfiguration("config.properties");