FileSystemXmlApplicationContext JBoss | Spring Context - FileSystemXmlApplicationContext Reads Wrong Resource Location from JBoss Standalone.xml

FileSystemXmlApplicationContext Reads Wrong Resource Location from JBoss

I have a legacy application which uses the following style to load Spring context:

String rootDir = System.getProperty("rootDir");

StringBuffer path = new StringBuffer();

path.append(rootDir);
path.append("/spring-context.xml");

ApplicationContext ctx = new FileSystemXmlApplicationContext(path.toString()); 

The 'rootDir' system property is defined in JBoss's standalone.xml as follow:

<system-properties>
  <property name="rootDir" value="/opt/jboss-as-7.1.1.Final/modules/someproject/main/conf"/>
</system-properties> 

The spring-context.xml file is put under "/opt/jboss-as-7.1.1.Final/modules/someproject/main/conf".
However, when I started JBoss and got this application running, it gave me this exception:

org.springframework.beans.factory.BeanDefinitionStoreException: IOException parsing XML document from file [/root/opt/jboss-as-7.1.1.Final/modules/com/someproject/main/conf/spring-context.xml]; nested exception is java.io.FileNotFoundException: opt/jboss-as-7.1.1.Final/modules/com/someproject/main/conf/spring-context.xml (The system cannot find the path specified)

It was weird because from the log it tried to load Spring context from "
opt/jboss-as-7.1.1.Final/modules/someproject/main/conf" (there is no "/" before "opt").

What happened?

FileSystemXmlApplicationContext  Source Code

I tried to search on the Internet but got no answer. So I decided to read through source code based on the exception stack trace.

Finally I found the following code from FileSystemXmlApplicationContext.

protected Resource getResourceByPath(String path) {
  if (path != null && path.startsWith("/")) {
    path = path.substring(1);
  }
  return new FileSystemResource(path);
}

So it was Spring that removed the beginning slash!

Spring's Javadoc explains why:

<b>NOTE:</b> Plain paths will always be interpreted as relative
 * to the current VM working directory, even if they start with a slash.
 * (This is consistent with the semantics in a Servlet container.)
 * <b>Use an explicit "file:" prefix to enforce an absolute file path.</b>

OK. So the solution to this problem is:

JBoss System Properties Setting for FileSystemXmlApplicationContext to Work

1. Add an additional "/" to the beginning of the path, like this:

<system-properties>
  <property name="rootDir" value="//opt/jboss-as-7.1.1.Final/modules/someproject/main/conf"/>
</system-properties>

2. Prefix with "file:" to the path

<system-properties>
  <property name="rootDir" value="file:/opt/jboss-as-7.1.1.Final/modules/someproject/main/conf"/>
</system-properties>

I've tested solution 1 and it worked fine. I suppose solution 2 should also work.