Whenever I deploy an application for the first time, I get a message saying : application-deployments/app-name/principals.xml not found. I then create a principals.xml in that location and the application deploys correctly. Is there a way to include the principals.xml in the .ear file or application directory so that it does not have to be put in the application-deployments directory at run time? I have a line in my server.xml that says: <principals path="./principals.xml" /> Thanks .