Tomcat-Does servlet-api.jar is loaded to classpath?

Question

I'm trying to run a web app which invokes a method which uses javax.servlet.http.HttpServletRequest. The web-app is written in Spring and runs on Tomcat 7.0.

I'm getting a ClassNotFoundException :

    SEVERE: Servlet.service() for servlet [crunchify] in context with path [] threw exception [Servlet execution threw an exception] with root cause
java.lang.ClassNotFoundException: javax.servlet.http.HttpServletRequest
    at java.net.URLClassLoader.findClass(URLClassLoader.java:381)
    at java.lang.ClassLoader.loadClass(ClassLoader.java:424)
    at sun.misc.Launcher$AppClassLoader.loadClass(Launcher.java:331)
    at java.lang.ClassLoader.loadClass(ClassLoader.java:357)
    at io.demo.HttpServletRequestWrapper.getHeaders(HttpServletRequestWrapper.java:21)
    at io.demo.MagicHelper.doMagic(MagicHelper.java:25)
    at org.springframework.web.servlet.FrameworkServlet.processRequest(FrameworkServlet.java)
    at org.springframework.web.servlet.FrameworkServlet.doGet(FrameworkServlet.java:857)
    at javax.servlet.http.HttpServlet.service(HttpServlet.java:624)
    at org.springframework.web.servlet.FrameworkServlet.service(FrameworkServlet.java:842)
    at javax.servlet.http.HttpServlet.service(HttpServlet.java:731)
    at org.apache.catalina.core.ApplicationFilterChain.internalDoFilter(ApplicationFilterChain.java:303)
    at org.apache.catalina.core.ApplicationFilterChain.doFilter(ApplicationFilterChain.java:208)
    at org.apache.tomcat.websocket.server.WsFilter.doFilter(WsFilter.java:52)
    at org.apache.catalina.core.ApplicationFilterChain.internalDoFilter(ApplicationFilterChain.java:241)
    at org.apache.catalina.core.ApplicationFilterChain.doFilter(ApplicationFilterChain.java:208)
    at org.apache.catalina.core.StandardWrapperValve.invoke(StandardWrapperValve.java:220)
    at org.apache.catalina.core.StandardContextValve.invoke(StandardContextValve.java:122)
    at org.apache.catalina.authenticator.AuthenticatorBase.invoke(AuthenticatorBase.java:505)
    at org.apache.catalina.core.StandardHostValve.invoke(StandardHostValve.java:170)
    at org.apache.catalina.valves.ErrorReportValve.invoke(ErrorReportValve.java:103)
    at org.apache.catalina.valves.AccessLogValve.invoke(AccessLogValve.java:956)
    at org.apache.catalina.core.StandardEngineValve.invoke(StandardEngineValve.java:116)
    at org.apache.catalina.connector.CoyoteAdapter.service(CoyoteAdapter.java:423)
    at org.apache.coyote.http11.AbstractHttp11Processor.process(AbstractHttp11Processor.java:1079)
    at org.apache.coyote.AbstractProtocol$AbstractConnectionHandler.process(AbstractProtocol.java:625)
    at org.apache.tomcat.util.net.JIoEndpoint$SocketProcessor.run(JIoEndpoint.java:316)
    at java.util.concurrent.ThreadPoolExecutor.runWorker(ThreadPoolExecutor.java:1142)
    at java.util.concurrent.ThreadPoolExecutor$Worker.run(ThreadPoolExecutor.java:617)
    at org.apache.tomcat.util.threads.TaskThread$WrappingRunnable.run(TaskThread.java:61)
    at java.lang.Thread.run(Thread.java:745)

This issue is resolved only if I edit Catalina.bat to include the servlet-api.jar. The problem is that as far as I understand from Tomcat's documentation, that is that the servlet-api.jar should be on the classpath .

Am I missing something??

I'll appreciate your help!

EDIT: This is my pom.

<project xmlns="http://maven.apache.org/POM/4.0.0" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
    xsi:schemaLocation="http://maven.apache.org/POM/4.0.0 http://maven.apache.org/xsd/maven-4.0.0.xsd">
    <modelVersion>4.0.0</modelVersion>
    <groupId>CrunchifySpringMVCTutorial</groupId>
    <artifactId>CrunchifySpringMVCTutorial</artifactId>
    <version>0.0.1-SNAPSHOT</version>
    <packaging>war</packaging>

    <dependencies>
        <dependency>
            <groupId>org.springframework</groupId>
            <artifactId>spring-context</artifactId>
            <version>4.1.1.RELEASE</version>
        </dependency>
        <dependency>
            <groupId>org.springframework</groupId>
            <artifactId>spring-aop</artifactId>
            <version>4.1.1.RELEASE</version>
        </dependency>
        <dependency>
            <groupId>org.springframework</groupId>
            <artifactId>spring-webmvc</artifactId>
            <version>4.1.1.RELEASE</version>
        </dependency>
        <dependency>
            <groupId>org.springframework</groupId>
            <artifactId>spring-web</artifactId>
            <version>4.1.1.RELEASE</version>
        </dependency>

        <!-- <dependency> <groupId>javax.servlet</groupId> <artifactId>jstl</artifactId> 
            <version>1.2</version> </dependency> -->
        <dependency>
            <groupId>javax.servlet</groupId>
            <artifactId>javax.servlet-api</artifactId>
            <version>3.0.1</version>
            <scope>provided</scope>
        </dependency>

        <dependency>
            <groupId>commons-logging</groupId>
            <artifactId>commons-logging</artifactId>
            <version>1.1.3</version>
        </dependency>
    </dependencies>
    <build>
        <sourceDirectory>src</sourceDirectory>
        <plugins>
            <plugin>
                <artifactId>maven-compiler-plugin</artifactId>
                <version>3.1</version>
                <configuration>
                    <source>1.7</source>
                    <target>1.7</target>
                </configuration>
            </plugin>
            <plugin>
                <artifactId>maven-war-plugin</artifactId>
                <version>2.4</version>
                <configuration>
                    <warSourceDirectory>WebContent</warSourceDirectory>
                    <failOnMissingWebXml>false</failOnMissingWebXml>
                </configuration>
            </plugin>

            <plugin>
                <groupId>org.codehaus.mojo</groupId>
                <artifactId>tomcat-maven-plugin</artifactId>
                <version>1.1</version>
                <configuration>
                    <url>http://localhost:8080/manager/text</url>
                    <server>TomcatServer</server>
                    <path>/SpringHelloWorld</path>
                </configuration>
            </plugin>
        </plugins>
    </build>
</project>

Answer 1

Tomcat probably does include this jar, but your IDE and standard JRE does not. So usually I always download J2EE related jars and include them into my app classpath, so I can compile and debug them in my IDE. Once those jars are part of my app everything is working just fine. The dependency usually defined in pom.xml file if you work with maven:

    <dependency>
        <groupId>javax.servlet</groupId>
        <artifactId>javax.servlet-api</artifactId>
        <version>3.1.0</version>
    </dependency>