Servlet : Null pointer exception, could not initialize custom class

[Rajesh Ronald Reagan]

Hi All,

Good day, am struck with a basic error, which the designed application isnt moving ahead.

The servlet which is configured for initializing the backend process throws NPE.

Following is the code of the servlet.

package com.pv.ej.servlet;

/**
 * @author ronaldreagan
 * 
 * Servlet implementation class SetIndexConfig
 * 
 * This servlet class loads the configuration details for the search Engine.
 * Class loaded on startup, adds the data directory 
 * 
 * and the index location to backend process.
 * 
 *
 */



import java.io.IOException;



import javax.servlet.ServletException;
import javax.servlet.ServletRequest;
import javax.servlet.ServletResponse;
import javax.servlet.http.HttpServlet;
import javax.servlet.http.HttpServletRequest;
import javax.servlet.http.HttpServletResponse;

import org.apache.log4j.Logger;

import com.pv.ej.process.Backend;
import com.pv.ej.process.SearchPreferences;


public class SetIndexConfig extends HttpServlet
{
	
	private static final long serialVersionUID = 1L;
	
	static Logger APILog = Logger.getLogger(SetIndexConfig.class);
	
	private Backend be;
	
	private SearchPreferences sp;

	/**
     * @see HttpServlet#HttpServlet()
     */
    public SetIndexConfig() 
    {
        
    		        	
   
    }

    
    public void init()throws ServletException
    {
    	
			try
			{
    		
    	    sp = new SearchPreferences();
    	    be= new Backend();
    	    
    	    sp.initialize(be);
    	    
    	    }
    	    catch(Exception ex)
    	    {
    	    	APILog.info("Error on intializing:"+ex.getLocalizedMessage());
    	    	System.out.println("Error on intializing:"+ex.getLocalizedMessage());
    	    }
   	  		
    	
    }
	/**
	 * @see Servlet#init(ServletConfig)
	 */
    /**
	 * @see HttpServlet#doGet(HttpServletRequest request, HttpServletResponse response)
	 */
	protected void doGet(HttpServletRequest request, HttpServletResponse response) throws ServletException, IOException 
	{
	}

	protected void doPost(HttpServletRequest request, HttpServletResponse response) throws ServletException, IOException {
		// TODO Auto-generated method stub
	}

	@Override
	public void service(ServletRequest arg0, ServletResponse arg1)
			throws ServletException, IOException {
		// TODO Auto-generated method stub
		
	}


	/* (non-Javadoc)
	 * @see javax.servlet.GenericServlet#destroy()
	 */
	@Override
	public void destroy() 
	{
		super.destroy();
	}
	
	

}

And the web.xml

<servlet> <servlet-name>SetIndexConfig</servlet-name> <servlet-class>com.pv.ej.servlet.SetIndexConfig</servlet-class> <load-on-startup>2</load-on-startup> </servlet>

i gave value 2 since am loading 2 more servlets freemarker and log4j servlet.

I tried in multiple ways but no use.

This is the error log.

2013-05-28 10:18:02,102 0    [Thread-3] INFO  com.pv.ej.servlet.SetIndexConfig  - Error on intializing:null

Any help would be appreciated.

Regards,
Ronald Reagan Jr.