> From: Timothy J Schumacher [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> Subject: multiple copies of jar files
>
> TC 5.0.12
> java version "1.4.1_04"

Both sadly outdated and unsupported.

> $CATALINA_HOME/server/lib/catalina.jar
> $CATALINA_HOME/shared/lib/catalina.jar

That's probably not good; catalina.jar should only be in server/lib.  The 
shared/lib directory is empty on a default Tomcat, and should be used only for 
classes that must be shared across multiple webapps.

> I am under the impression that having multiple copies of the same jar
> file is not ever a good thing!

Usually not.  In this particular case, it won't hurt Tomcat, and the classes 
loaded out of shared will not conflict with ones in server because they're in 
different branches of the classloader tree:

      Bootstrap
          |
       System
          |
       Common
      /      \
 Catalina   Shared
             /   \
        Webapp1  Webapp2 ...

(See http://tomcat.apache.org/tomcat-5.5-doc/class-loader-howto.html for more 
detail.)

It looks like someone thought putting catalina.jar into shared/lib would give 
webapps access to Tomcat's internal classes - but it won't really, since they 
use different classloaders.

> If an application wants to use a class from catalina.jar,

Applications should not be using classes from catalina.jar; that's scary.

> does that mean catalina.jar needs to be deleted from
> server/lib and placed in shared/lib?

It would have to go into common/lib, but it's a really, really bad idea to 
build a webapp around Tomcat-specific class files.

 - Chuck


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