[mvelik]

Hello,

I am tasked to port an application from Weblogic 8.1.5 to Websphere 6. In doing so I would like to use MyEclipse for remote debugging. Here is the problem.

I did run through the steps of deploying an .ear to Websphere – it was painful, but finally I got it working. When I start an application server from the dos prompt using a “standard” websphere batch file it starts ok. When I try to do the same from MyEclipse I am getting the following error:

[1/2/07 9:27:31:968 EST] 0000001a ServiceLogger I com.ibm.ws.ffdc.IncidentStreamImpl initialize FFDC0009I: FFDC opened incident stream file c:\IBM\WebSphere\AppServer\profiles\AppSrv04\logs\ffdc\server1_203c203c_07.01.02_09.27.31_0.txt
[1/2/07 9:27:32:219 EST] 0000001a ServiceLogger I com.ibm.ws.ffdc.IncidentStreamImpl resetIncidentStream FFDC0010I: FFDC closed incident stream file c:\IBM\WebSphere\AppServer\profiles\AppSrv04\logs\ffdc\server1_203c203c_07.01.02_09.27.31_0.txt
[1/2/07 9:27:32:251 EST] 0000001a WebApp        E   Extension processor failed to initialize in factory: com.ibm.ws.jsf.extprocessor.JSFExtensionFactory@9a809a8
java.lang.NullPointerException
    at com.sun.faces.util.MessageFactory.getApplication(MessageFactory.java:237)
    at com.sun.faces.util.MessageFactory.getMessage(MessageFactory.java:120)
    at com.sun.faces.util.MessageFactory.getMessage(MessageFactory.java:107)
    at com.sun.faces.util.Util.getExceptionMessageString(Util.java:429)
    at com.sun.faces.util.Util.getExceptionMessageString(Util.java:443)
    at com.sun.faces.util.Util.doAssert(Util.java:1302)
    at com.sun.faces.util.Util.verifyFactoriesAndInitDefaultRenderKit(Util.java:473)
    at com.ibm.ws.jsf.configuration.FacesConfig.initialize(FacesConfig.java:96)
    at com.ibm.ws.jsf.extprocessor.JSFExtensionFactory.createExtensionProcessor(JSFExtensionFactory.java:107)
    at com.ibm.ws.webcontainer.webapp.WebApp.initializeExtensionProcessors(WebApp.java:1029)
    at com.ibm.ws.webcontainer.webapp.WebApp.commonInitializationFinish(WebApp.java:255)
    at com.ibm.ws.wswebcontainer.webapp.WebApp.initialize(WebApp.java:271)
    at com.ibm.ws.wswebcontainer.webapp.WebGroup.addWebApplication(WebGroup.java:88)
    at com.ibm.ws.wswebcontainer.VirtualHost.addWebApplication(VirtualHost.java:157)
    at com.ibm.ws.wswebcontainer.WebContainer.addWebApp(WebContainer.java:653)
    at com.ibm.ws.wswebcontainer.WebContainer.addWebApplication(WebContainer.java:606)
    at com.ibm.ws.webcontainer.component.WebContainerImpl.install(WebContainerImpl.java:333)
    at com.ibm.ws.webcontainer.component.WebContainerImpl.start(WebContainerImpl.java:549)
    at com.ibm.ws.runtime.component.ApplicationMgrImpl.start(ApplicationMgrImpl.java:1295)
    at com.ibm.ws.runtime.component.DeployedApplicationImpl.fireDeployedObjectStart(DeployedApplicationImpl.java:1129)
    at com.ibm.ws.runtime.component.DeployedModuleImpl.start(DeployedModuleImpl.java:567)
    at com.ibm.ws.runtime.component.DeployedApplicationImpl.start(DeployedApplicationImpl.java:814)
    at com.ibm.ws.runtime.component.ApplicationMgrImpl.startApplication(ApplicationMgrImpl.java:948)
    at com.ibm.ws.runtime.component.ApplicationMgrImpl$AppInitializer.run(ApplicationMgrImpl.java:2114)
    at com.ibm.wsspi.runtime.component.WsComponentImpl$_AsynchInitializer.run(WsComponentImpl.java:340)
    at com.ibm.ws.util.ThreadPool$Worker.run(ThreadPool.java:1498)

I tried to include all possible IBM and non-IBM libraries into the classpath but it does not seem to help much.

We use JSF from Sun, as well as a startup servlet to initialize certain services.

Any help/ideas will be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,

Mike

[Riyad Kalla]

Mike,
Few things first:
1) Try and blank out the entire “Paths” page for the WebSphere 6 connector… you shouldn’t need to set those up manually, the connector will discover all the default libs automatically.

2) Make sure you have setup WebSphere to run with the JDK that it ships under it’s install dir, and not another JDK.

Try and restart it, does it work now?

For example, my default install of WebSphere 6 here works fine, but I don’t know if you have done any customizations, so it’s hard to trouble shoot… what do your WS6 connector settings look like?

[mvelik]

Riyad,

Thanks for your quick reply.

1) The “Paths” contain now only our own libraries

2) Absolutely.

Unfortunately there is no difference. Seems like IBM has a problem loading/talking to the Java Server Faces we use. I’ve heard that Websphere has its own implementation of JSF, could it be a problem?

Thanks for your help,

Mike

[Riyad Kalla]

Mike,
That could definately be it… I’ve seen problems with JSF before on app servers partly because it’s part of the spec now, so each app server company is rolling their own implementation and you can no longer ship your own libs easily (like say Struts).

Can you try changing the version of JSF you are using and see if the error changes or disappears (in which case it was the problem) or try another app server and see if the app magically works out of the box (in which case it was the problem again)… maybe just a few things to help narrow down what is going on.

[mvelik]

Riyad,

The application is currently in production on Weblogic 8.1.5. So we know everything works on Weblogic.

I will try what you suggested.

And by the way, since you mentioned problems with Struts, can you point me to a documentation and/or some instructions on how to deploy Struts-based application on Websphere 6?

Thanks,

Mike

[Riyad Kalla]

And by the way, since you mentioned problems with Struts, can you point me to a documentation and/or some instructions on how to deploy Struts-based application on Websphere 6?

Actually I was using Struts as an example of something that can be deployed easily, because it’s not part of the spec, so it’s not part of the app server and you can deploy your own libs with your app.

Where as JSF is part of the JEE 5 spec now, so it will start coming *with* the server install. (and there is no guaruntee that each impl will be completely compatible)

[mvelik]

Riyad,

I know this is not a right place, but since we started this conversation, are yo by any chance aware of any issues with reflection on Websphere. As a part of our framework we use Castor (which by the way works great on Weblogic). This very same code produces a null pointer exception when being deployed on Websphere, and this exception occurs inside Castor while loading an XML file.

Best regards,

Mike

[Riyad Kalla]

I know this is not a right place, but since we started this conversation, are yo by any chance aware of any issues with reflection on Websphere.

Hmm, I’m not to be honest. I do know that WS uses the IBM JDK, and I have personally seen differences in reflection between Sun, IBM, and BEA’s VMs before with extremely reflection heavy code.

This very same code produces a null pointer exception when being deployed on Websphere, and this exception occurs inside Castor while loading an XML file.

I’ve personally seen this with JAXB, which is another reflection heavy mapping technology. I’ve used Castor a lot a few years ago and it served us well, but we always used it with a Sun VM… I’m unfortunately not aware of any WebSphere or WebLogic specifics that would shed light on this issue…

If it is an IBM JDK issue, can you try a newer IBM JDK just for kicks and see if it fixed the issue?

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