tomcat incommunicado

[Aodhan Hoffman]

I am trying to install and get working a tomcat app on a server I don't administer. The sysadmin doesn't know tomcat. I uploaded the files but tomcat doesn't recognize anything I do.

I've added a context for my app to the server.xml file, I've created the appropriate directories in the webapps folder, and tomcat was restarted. However, tomcat can't seem to pull up anything i my directory, or any other directory ( including ROOT ). I get 'resource unavailable' messages with no error in the log.

When I go to 'remotehost;8080/manager/html/list' and try to log in to restart my web application or see if it is even listed, it refuses me. ( I've set up a clear text name/password in the tomcat-users.xml file ). I've tried accessing the manager locally using lynx and gotten the same response.

When I try this, there is an error in the catalina.log file:

Oct 22, 2004 4:33:04 PM org.apache.coyote.tomcat5.CoyoteAdapter service
SEVERE: An exception or error occurred in the container during the request processing
java.lang.NullPointerException
at org.apache.catalina.realm.RealmBase.findSecurityConstraints(RealmBase.java:475)
at org.apache.catalina.authenticator.AuthenticatorBase.invoke(AuthenticatorBase.java:502)
at org.apache.catalina.core.StandardValveContext.invokeNext(StandardValveContext.java:149)
at org.apache.catalina.core.StandardPipeline.invoke(StandardPipeline.java:567)
at org.apache.catalina.core.StandardHostValve.invoke(StandardHostValve.java:184)
at org.apache.catalina.core.StandardValveContext.invokeNext(StandardValveContext.java:151)
at org.apache.catalina.valves.ErrorReportValve.invoke(ErrorReportValve.java:164)
at org.apache.catalina.core.StandardValveContext.invokeNext(StandardValveContext.java:149)
at org.apache.catalina.core.StandardPipeline.invoke(StandardPipeline.java:567)
at org.apache.catalina.core.StandardEngineValve.invoke(StandardEngineValve.java:156)
at org.apache.catalina.core.StandardValveContext.invokeNext(StandardValveContext.java:151)
at org.apache.catalina.core.StandardPipeline.invoke(StandardPipeline.java:567)
...

I've looked throughout the conf files but can't see anything wrong.

Does anyone have any idea of any configuration or installation problems that might be hampering me? Thanks!

( Because I can't even bring up the ROOT/index.jsp page, I don't know what version I'm working with. I was simply assured it was tomcat 5.x )

[William Brogden]

However, tomcat can't seem to pull up anything i my directory, or any other directory ( including ROOT ). I get 'resource unavailable' messages with no error in the log.

There is no point in trying to access the manager application if you can't even get to the ROOT pages. When was the last time this Tomcat installation actually worked?
Bill

[Ray Stojonic]

as far as the version goes, look in common/lib, if you see servlet-api.jar instead of servlet.jar, you can be pretty confident that you have 5

[Mike Curwen]

I've looked in the CVS. In and around line 475 there is this comment:

// If patterns is null, continue to avoid an NPE
// See Bugzilla 30624
if ( patterns == null) {
continue;
}

http://nagoya.apache.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=30624

I dunno.... maybe you've got the version that is still buggy in this regard.

[Aodhan Hoffman]

Okay, thanks for the tips. I am definitely dealing with tomcat 5. But I don't know if this install has EVER worked. No one else uses it at the moment.

If we were to try debugging, which application context should I look at increasing the debugging to see what is going on?

[Joyce Lee]

Hi Aodhan,

As Bill has pointed out, did you manage to access the root page http://localhost:8080 before adding the context to server.xml? You can go to C:\tomcat-XXX\webapps\ROOT\RELEASE-NOTES.txt to check which version you're using. Which OS are you running?

You might want to take a look at CoreServlets: Tomcat and Tomcat website.

Joyce

[William Brogden]

Well, the first thing to do is to see if Tomcat is even running. You said you:

I get 'resource unavailable' messages with no error in the log.

Is that the ever-so-helpful MSIE browser message or are you actually getting the unavailable message from Tomcat?
MSIE has this nasty "Friendly HTTP error messages" setting that will conceal useful error messages. Be sure it is turned off in "Internet Options->Advanced"
Bill