HttpsURLConnection Connects Time out on Geronimo

[Rob Silver]

I have a servlet that makes a secure connection to a remote system to execute a REST message (XML over HTTP). There is no WSDL portion unfortunately ... the remote party made their own design decisions outside of my control.

I am housing my servlet on a Geronimo 1.1 server. For some reason I cannot make the connection to the remote service when it is housed on Geronimo 1.1. When I attempt to make the connection in a stand alone stub application, or deploy the servlet under Tomcat 5.5, the system works properly. It is only Geronimo 1.1 that things fail to function. I am wondering if someone can help shed some light as it has held me up for far too long.

Some code:

The method I use to setup security settings. I have PKIS verificaiton path issues so I use the following code...

private void doSecurityStuff() {
myLogger.info("Implementing custom security objects.");
System.setProperty("java.protocol.handler.pkgs","com.sun.net.ssl.internal.www.protocol");
Security.addProvider(new com.sun.net.ssl.internal.ssl.Provider());
Security.setProperty("ssl.SocketFactory.provider",
"com.test.CustomSSLFactory");
HttpsURLConnection.setDefaultSSLSocketFactory(new CustomSSLFactory());
HttpsURLConnection.setDefaultHostnameVerifier(H_V);
myLogger.info("Custom security objects implemented.");
}

Note that H_V refers to the following object.
(Implemented because cert hostname does not match IP used. This is an issue with the remote system rather than my cert so I just need to work with it best I can).

private static final HostnameVerifier H_V = new HostnameVerifier() {
public boolean verify(String arg0, SSLSession arg1) {
return true;
}
};

These are 2 helper classes I use for the SSL Factory

import com.sun.net.ssl.*;
import java.io.IOException;
import java.net.InetAddress;
import java.net.Socket;
 
import javax.net.SocketFactory;
import javax.net.ssl.SSLSocketFactory;
 
public class CustomSSLFactory extends SSLSocketFactory {
    private SSLSocketFactory factory;
 
    public CustomSSLFactory() {
      try {
        SSLContext sslcontext = SSLContext.getInstance( "TLS");
        sslcontext.init( null, // No KeyManager required
            new TrustManager[] { new CustomTrustManager()},
            new java.security.SecureRandom());
        factory = ( SSLSocketFactory) sslcontext.getSocketFactory();
      } catch( Exception ex) {
        ex.printStackTrace();
      }
    }
 
    public static SocketFactory getDefault() {
      return new CustomSSLFactory();
    }
 
    public Socket createSocket( Socket socket, String s, int i, boolean flag)
        throws IOException {
      return factory.createSocket( socket, s, i, flag);
    }
 
    public Socket createSocket( InetAddress inaddr, int i, InetAddress inaddr1, int j) 
    throws IOException {
      return factory.createSocket( inaddr, i, inaddr1, j);
    }
 
    public Socket createSocket( InetAddress inaddr, int i) throws IOException {
      return factory.createSocket( inaddr, i);
    }
 
    public Socket createSocket( String s, int i, InetAddress inaddr, int j)
        throws IOException {
      return factory.createSocket( s, i, inaddr, j);
    }
 
    public Socket createSocket( String s, int i) throws IOException {
      return factory.createSocket( s, i);
    }
 
    public String[] getDefaultCipherSuites() {
      return factory.getSupportedCipherSuites();
    }
 
    public String[] getSupportedCipherSuites() {
      return factory.getSupportedCipherSuites();
    }
  }
 
import com.sun.net.ssl.X509TrustManager;
import java.security.cert.X509Certificate;
 
public class CustomTrustManager implements X509TrustManager {
 
    public boolean isClientTrusted( X509Certificate[] cert) {
      return true;
    }
 
    public boolean isServerTrusted( X509Certificate[] cert) {
      return true;
    }
 
    public X509Certificate[] getAcceptedIssuers() {
      return new X509Certificate[ 0];
    }
  }

Now for the meat and potatoes....
This method is what I call to send a string message (XML format) to the remote system. When I run it on Geronimo the "OutputStreamWriter osw = new OutputStreamWriter(urlc.getOutputStream());" line times out trying to connect and an exception is thrown. Again.. this is ONLY under Geronimo.

private String sendAndReceiveWithTCD(String msg) throws MalformedURLException, IOException, ProtocolException {
//Secure
String resourceURI = <a href="https://123.456.789.87/cgi-bin/remotemethod";" target="_blank" rel="nofollow">https://123.456.789.87/cgi-bin/remotemethod";</a>

URL page = new URL(resourceURI);

//Create message and header
HttpsURLConnection urlc = (HttpsURLConnection)page.openConnection();

urlc.setSSLSocketFactory(new CustomSSLFactory());
urlc.setHostnameVerifier(H_V);

HttpsURLConnection.setFollowRedirects(false);

urlc.setRequestProperty("Content-Type", "text/xml");
urlc.setRequestMethod("POST");
urlc.setDoInput(true);
urlc.setDoOutput(true);
urlc.setUseCaches(false);

//Send data:
  OutputStreamWriter osw = new OutputStreamWriter(urlc.getOutputStream());
          osw.write(msg);
          osw.flush();
          osw.close();
 
//Read response
BufferedReader in = new BufferedReader(new InputStreamReader(urlc
.getInputStream()));
 
String inputLine;
StringBuffer sb = new StringBuffer();
while ((inputLine = in.readLine()) != null) {
sb.append(inputLine);
}
in.close(); 
return sb.toString();
}

Any and all input is appreciated.. I have reviewed forumns and tried various work arounds but nothing seems to work under Geronimo.

Thanks,
Rob

[Rob Silver]

So I found a solution to the problem...

I use a Proxy object in the url open connection method which resolves the issue.

The change was from:

//Create message and header
HttpsURLConnection urlc = (HttpsURLConnection)page.openConnection();

to

Proxy proxy = new Proxy(Proxy.Type.HTTP, new  InetSocketAddress("company-proxy", 8080));  
HttpsURLConnection urlc = (HttpsURLConnection)page.openConnection(proxy);

Originally I was setting the java system proxy property, which seems to work on Tomcat but for whatever reason it doesn't on Geronimo. I have checked that the involved classes are of the same type (java.net.URL and sun.net.www.protocol.https.HttpsURLConnectionImpl) so either its one of the classes used by my objects of these classes, or a system setting I guess that is changed in Geronimo as opposed to Tomcat.