Java Spring Boot - spring-boot-starter-tomcat dependency doesn't work with scope provided when running locally

Question

I'm developing a Java Spring Boot application that needs to run on our client's Tomcat server. This application basically contains a REST API that serves files to our frontend.

Running this application locally went great until our first deployment testing on the client's servers. We had to refactor our code and add some dependencies to the projects' pom.xml. This eventually worked (kind of).

Now I wanted to again start developing locally and noticed my code wasn't able to run with the same run config I used before. While executing mvn spring-boot:run worked fine, I needed IntelliJ's debug functionality to be able to proceed development.

After some searching I identified the issue in my pom.xml:

<dependency>
    <groupId>org.springframework.boot</groupId>
    <artifactId>spring-boot-starter-tomcat</artifactId>
    <scope>provided</scope>
</dependency>

While the <scope>provided</scope> was necessary to run the generated WAR file on the tomcat, I gave some issues running locally. To be more specific, following errors were generated:

java.lang.IllegalStateException: ApplicationEventMulticaster not initialized - call 'refresh' before multicasting events via the context: org.springframework.context.annotation.AnnotationConfigApplicationContext@2a693f59: startup date [Mon Nov 06 10:52:25 CET 2017]; root of context hierarchy
at Org.springframework.context.support.AbstractApplicationContext.getApplicationEventMulticaster(AbstractApplicationContext.java:414) [spring-context-4.3.12.RELEASE.jar:4.3.12.RELEASE]
at org.springframework.context.support.ApplicationListenerDetector.postProcessBeforeDestruction(ApplicationListenerDetector.java:97) ~[spring-context-4.3.12.RELEASE.jar:4.3.12.RELEASE]
at org.springframework.beans.factory.support.DisposableBeanAdapter.destroy(DisposableBeanAdapter.java:253) ~[spring-beans-4.3.12.RELEASE.jar:4.3.12.RELEASE]
at org.springframework.beans.factory.support.DefaultSingletonBeanRegistry.destroyBean(DefaultSingletonBeanRegistry.java:578) [spring-beans-4.3.12.RELEASE.jar:4.3.12.RELEASE]
at org.springframework.beans.factory.support.DefaultSingletonBeanRegistry.destroySingleton(DefaultSingletonBeanRegistry.java:554) [spring-beans-4.3.12.RELEASE.jar:4.3.12.RELEASE]
at org.springframework.beans.factory.support.DefaultListableBeanFactory.destroySingleton(DefaultListableBeanFactory.java:961) [spring-beans-4.3.12.RELEASE.jar:4.3.12.RELEASE]
at org.springframework.beans.factory.support.DefaultSingletonBeanRegistry.destroySingletons(DefaultSingletonBeanRegistry.java:523) [spring-beans-4.3.12.RELEASE.jar:4.3.12.RELEASE]
at org.springframework.beans.factory.support.FactoryBeanRegistrySupport.destroySingletons(FactoryBeanRegistrySupport.java:230) [spring-beans-4.3.12.RELEASE.jar:4.3.12.RELEASE]
at org.springframework.beans.factory.support.DefaultListableBeanFactory.destroySingletons(DefaultListableBeanFactory.java:968) [spring-beans-4.3.12.RELEASE.jar:4.3.12.RELEASE]
at org.springframework.context.support.AbstractApplicationContext.destroyBeans(AbstractApplicationContext.java:1030) [spring-context-4.3.12.RELEASE.jar:4.3.12.RELEASE]
at org.springframework.context.support.AbstractApplicationContext.refresh(AbstractApplicationContext.java:556) [spring-context-4.3.12.RELEASE.jar:4.3.12.RELEASE]
at org.springframework.boot.SpringApplication.refresh(SpringApplication.java:693) [spring-boot-1.5.8.RELEASE.jar:1.5.8.RELEASE]
at org.springframework.boot.SpringApplication.refreshContext(SpringApplication.java:360) [spring-boot-1.5.8.RELEASE.jar:1.5.8.RELEASE]
at org.springframework.boot.SpringApplication.run(SpringApplication.java:303) [spring-boot-1.5.8.RELEASE.jar:1.5.8.RELEASE]
at org.springframework.boot.SpringApplication.run(SpringApplication.java:1118) [spring-boot-1.5.8.RELEASE.jar:1.5.8.RELEASE]
at org.springframework.boot.SpringApplication.run(SpringApplication.java:1107) [spring-boot-1.5.8.RELEASE.jar:1.5.8.RELEASE]
at be.craftworkz.engima.acerta.boilerplate.BoilerplateApplication.main(BoilerplateApplication.java:23) [classes/:na]

org.springframework.beans.factory.BeanDefinitionStoreException: Failed to parse configuration class [be.craftworkz.engima.acerta.boilerplate.BoilerplateApplication]; nested exception is java.lang.IllegalStateException: Failed to introspect annotated methods on class org.springframework.boot.web.support.SpringBootServletInitializer
at org.springframework.context.annotation.ConfigurationClassParser.parse(ConfigurationClassParser.java:181) ~[spring-context-4.3.12.RELEASE.jar:4.3.12.RELEASE]
at org.springframework.context.annotation.ConfigurationClassPostProcessor.processConfigBeanDefinitions(ConfigurationClassPostProcessor.java:308) ~[spring-context-4.3.12.RELEASE.jar:4.3.12.RELEASE]
at org.springframework.context.annotation.ConfigurationClassPostProcessor.postProcessBeanDefinitionRegistry(ConfigurationClassPostProcessor.java:228) ~[spring-context-4.3.12.RELEASE.jar:4.3.12.RELEASE]
at org.springframework.context.support.PostProcessorRegistrationDelegate.invokeBeanDefinitionRegistryPostProcessors(PostProcessorRegistrationDelegate.java:272) ~[spring-context-4.3.12.RELEASE.jar:4.3.12.RELEASE]
at org.springframework.context.support.PostProcessorRegistrationDelegate.invokeBeanFactoryPostProcessors(PostProcessorRegistrationDelegate.java:92) ~[spring-context-4.3.12.RELEASE.jar:4.3.12.RELEASE]
at org.springframework.context.support.AbstractApplicationContext.invokeBeanFactoryPostProcessors(AbstractApplicationContext.java:687) ~[spring-context-4.3.12.RELEASE.jar:4.3.12.RELEASE]
at org.springframework.context.support.AbstractApplicationContext.refresh(AbstractApplicationContext.java:525) ~[spring-context-4.3.12.RELEASE.jar:4.3.12.RELEASE]
at org.springframework.boot.SpringApplication.refresh(SpringApplication.java:693) [spring-boot-1.5.8.RELEASE.jar:1.5.8.RELEASE]
at org.springframework.boot.SpringApplication.refreshContext(SpringApplication.java:360) [spring-boot-1.5.8.RELEASE.jar:1.5.8.RELEASE]
at org.springframework.boot.SpringApplication.run(SpringApplication.java:303) [spring-boot-1.5.8.RELEASE.jar:1.5.8.RELEASE]
at org.springframework.boot.SpringApplication.run(SpringApplication.java:1118) [spring-boot-1.5.8.RELEASE.jar:1.5.8.RELEASE]
at org.springframework.boot.SpringApplication.run(SpringApplication.java:1107) [spring-boot-1.5.8.RELEASE.jar:1.5.8.RELEASE]
at be.craftworkz.engima.acerta.boilerplate.BoilerplateApplication.main(BoilerplateApplication.java:23) [classes/:na]

Caused by: java.lang.IllegalStateException: Failed to introspect annotated methods on class org.springframework.boot.web.support.SpringBootServletInitializer
at org.springframework.core.type.StandardAnnotationMetadata.getAnnotatedMethods(StandardAnnotationMetadata.java:163) ~[spring-core-4.3.12.RELEASE.jar:4.3.12.RELEASE]
at org.springframework.context.annotation.ConfigurationClassParser.retrieveBeanMethodMetadata(ConfigurationClassParser.java:380) ~[spring-context-4.3.12.RELEASE.jar:4.3.12.RELEASE]
at org.springframework.context.annotation.ConfigurationClassParser.doProcessConfigurationClass(ConfigurationClassParser.java:314) ~[spring-context-4.3.12.RELEASE.jar:4.3.12.RELEASE]
at org.springframework.context.annotation.ConfigurationClassParser.processConfigurationClass(ConfigurationClassParser.java:245) ~[spring-context-4.3.12.RELEASE.jar:4.3.12.RELEASE]
at org.springframework.context.annotation.ConfigurationClassParser.parse(ConfigurationClassParser.java:198) ~[spring-context-4.3.12.RELEASE.jar:4.3.12.RELEASE]
at org.springframework.context.annotation.ConfigurationClassParser.parse(ConfigurationClassParser.java:167) ~[spring-context-4.3.12.RELEASE.jar:4.3.12.RELEASE]
... 12 common frames omitted
Caused by: java.lang.NoClassDefFoundError: javax/servlet/ServletContext
at java.lang.Class.getDeclaredMethods0(Native Method) ~[na:1.8.0_144]
at java.lang.Class.privateGetDeclaredMethods(Class.java:2701) ~[na:1.8.0_144]
at java.lang.Class.getDeclaredMethods(Class.java:1975) ~[na:1.8.0_144]
at org.springframework.core.type.StandardAnnotationMetadata.getAnnotatedMethods(StandardAnnotationMetadata.java:152) ~[spring-core-4.3.12.RELEASE.jar:4.3.12.RELEASE]
... 17 common frames omitted

Caused by: java.lang.ClassNotFoundException: javax.servlet.ServletContext
at java.net.URLClassLoader.findClass(URLClassLoader.java:381) ~[na:1.8.0_144]
at java.lang.ClassLoader.loadClass(ClassLoader.java:424) ~[na:1.8.0_144]
at sun.misc.Launcher$AppClassLoader.loadClass(Launcher.java:335) ~[na:1.8.0_144]
at java.lang.ClassLoader.loadClass(ClassLoader.java:357) ~[na:1.8.0_144]
... 21 common frames omitted

Removing this <scope>provided</scope> from my dependency solved the issue but I don't understand what the problem is here. So if someone could give a detailed explanation why this error occurs that would be awesome! I really want to avoid losing time to these kind of issues in the future so ...

Thanks!

TL;DR: How does the Maven dependency parameter <scope>provided</scope> affect running a Java Spring Boot application locally vs remotely on a Tomcat server?

Answer 1

The provided scope says that don't worry, these classes will exist at runtime, so there's no need to include them in the WAR.

Running in a full blown tomcat server, you can use provided since the classes (not in the WAR) are present. However running locally with embedded tomcat, it will fail because you said not to worry about the tomcat classes.

This means that you can't use the same scope for both dev and production. You could create different Maven profiles that use a different scope, and use a "dev" profile for local development.

Then it's as easy as adding a -Pdev whenever you're doing local development.