Packaging a Web Module

A web module must be packaged into a WAR in certain deployment scenarios and whenever you want to distribute the web module. You package a web module into a WAR by executing the jar command in a directory laid out in the format of a web module, by using the Ant utility, or by using the IDE tool of your choice. This tutorial shows you how to use NetBeans IDE or Ant to build, package, and deploy the hello1 sample application.

To Set the Context Root

A context root identifies a web application in a Java EE server. A context root must start with a forward slash (/) and end with a string.

In a packaged web module for deployment on the GlassFish Server, the context root is stored in sun-web.xml.

To view or edit the context root, follow these steps.

1. Expand the Web Pages and WEB-INF nodes of the hello1 project.

2. Double-click sun-web.xml.

3. In the General tab, observe that the Context Root field is set to /hello1.

   If you needed to edit this value, you could do so here. When you create a new application, you type the context root here.

4. (Optional) Click the XML tab.

   Observe that the context root value /hello1 is enclosed by the context-root element. You could also edit the value here.

To Build and Package the hello1 Web Module Using NetBeans IDE

1. Select File->Open Project.

2. In the Open Project dialog, navigate to:

   tut-install/examples/web/

3. Select the hello1 folder.

4. Select the Open as Main Project check box.

5. Click Open Project.

6. In the Projects tab, right-click the hello1 project and select Build.

To Build and Package the hello1 Web Module Using Ant

1. In a terminal window, go to:

   tut-install/examples/web/hello1/

2. Type the following command:

   ant

   This command spawns any necessary compilations, copies files to the directory tut-install/examples/web/hello1/build/, creates the WAR file, and copies it to the directory tut-install/examples/web/hello1/dist/.