在部署Java Web应用程序时，如何知道.properties文件的位置以读取配置？

Question

According to what I know Java Web applications are deployed on a server by deploying the .war file of the web application. Is this correct?

I have a Web application that has some configurations to allow the server administrator to configure the application at the time of deployment. Ex. Set the path where log files are to be saved, Set the location to store uploaded documents etc..

I defined such parameters in a .properties file and hardcode the path to it. Thereafter I was able to get the web application to read the values in the .properties file without recompiling the source code (as the .properties file path did not change).
Now I want to know how to do this without hardcoding the path to the .properties file so I can deploy this on any server without worrying about its directory structure.

So, is it possible to provide a .properties file along with the .war file when the web application is being deployed so that the server administrator can edit the .properties configuration file , deploy the .war file (without recompiling the web application) on a server and let it read the values in the .properties file?
If so how can the web application know where the .properties file is?

Answer 1

Best practise is to put the properties file at a location where it can be found on the classpath. Your application loads the file with

this.getClass().getClassLoader().getResourceAsStream( "myConfig.properties");

If the file is located in a non standard classpath location you can finetune your applications classpath using tomcats configuration possibilites. See eg Understanding The Tomcat Classpath