Question

Use relative path in Webapp to access Velocity templates...

Asked by: burtonrhodes

The code below works perfectly using a full file path to the velocity template file.  However, deploying this webapp using this method is tedious becasue I have to change the path everytime I deploy.  How can I use a realtive path from the webbapps directory?  

I have researched several examples, but they all require using a servlet implementation.  Does velocity have a realtive path setup in an easier manner?  There is only one page that uses this template in my entire web application, but this relative path thing is driving me crazy!  I am currently using: JSP, Struts 2.

public static String createXactionNotes() {
 
StringWriter writer = new StringWriter();
 
try {
	        	
                // Create the velocity context and add variables
	VelocityContext context = new VelocityContext();
	context.put("date",new DateTool());
	
	// Get the template
	File template = new File("C:/web/Apache Software Foundation/Tomcat 6.0/webapps/agentsymphony/velocityTemplates/xactionNotes.vm");
	FileReader reader = new FileReader(template);
 
	// Do the merge
	Velocity.init();
	Velocity.evaluate(context, writer, "LOG", reader);
    
} catch (Exception e) {
	log.fatal("Error generating XactionNotes report.", e);
}
 
return writer.toString();
	
}

                                  
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Asked On
2009-03-04 at 19:16:01ID24200222
Tags

Velocity

,

Relative Path

Topic

eXO Velocity

Participating Experts
1
Points
500
Comments
6

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Answers

 

by: objectsPosted on 2009-03-04 at 19:24:11ID: 23802353

InputStream in = MyClass.class.getResourceAsStream(resourcepath);

and put your teplates in WEB-INF/classes

 

by: burtonrhodesPosted on 2009-03-04 at 19:46:47ID: 23802450

I did the following:
1) I moved the "velocityTemplates" directory to the WEB-INF directory (I am using maven so there is no "classes" directory - should I create one and pur the directory there?)
2) replace MyClass to the name of the class where the method resides: ReportCreator
3) set resourcepath to the velocity file name

I am getting a null pointer exception at the InputStream line.  Also, Velocity.evaluate method using an InputStream is deprecated.

// Get the template
String templateFileName = "xactionNotes.vm";
//File template = new File(velocityPath + "/" + templateFileName);
//FileReader reader = new FileReader(template);
    		
 InputStream in = ReportCreator.class.getResourceAsStream("velocityTemplates/" + templateFileName);
 
// Do the merge
Velocity.init();
Velocity.evaluate(context, writer, "LOG", in);
                                              
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by: objectsPosted on 2009-03-04 at 19:49:30ID: 23802463

add a leading slash, otherwise it is treated as a relative path

 InputStream in = ReportCreator.class.getResourceAsStream("/velocityTemplates/" + templateFileName);

1) I moved the "velocityTemplates" directory to the WEB-INF directory (I am using maven so there is no "classes" directory - should I create one and pur the directory there?)

then put in a source directory, ie something that maven will package into classes

 

by: burtonrhodesPosted on 2009-03-04 at 19:56:05ID: 23802491

How about that - it works!  I ended up putting the vlocityTemplates directory in the resources src directory.

Any thoughts about the deprecated method?

 

by: objectsPosted on 2009-03-04 at 19:57:22ID: 23802493

wrap the InputStream in an InputStreamReader

 

by: burtonrhodesPosted on 2009-03-04 at 20:05:52ID: 31554164

I figured that was gonig to be an easy one.  I cannot tell you how easy you just made my life.  Many thanks.

20120131-EE-VQP-002

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