Unable to load primefaces-2.0.0.jar on Weblogic Start Up.

[Sudha Varadharajan]

Not sure if this post should belong in "weblogic" or "JSF" but since this is a error specific to JSF, I am posting it here.
I am using Weblogic11g which comes built in with "JSF1.2". I am trying out the new JSF2.0 implementation from "Primefaces" and so I had included "primefaces-2.0.0.jar" and Mojarra's JSF2.0 JARS in my WEB-INF/lib.

In my "weblogic.xml" I have the following setting:
<wls:container-descriptor>
<wls:prefer-web-inf-classes>true</wls:prefer-web-inf-classes>
</wls:container-descriptor>

What I see is:
1.) On Server Startup I see an exception ( please see exception below) to the effect that weblogic is unable to load "primefaces-2.0.0.jar" .
2.) However when I try a .xhtml page which uses the new JSF2.0 tags and Primefaces2.0 tags, everything works fine.

Since I have the <wls:prefer-web-inf-classes>true</wls:prefer-web-inf-classes> in weblogic.xml, I think the web classloader is able to load JSF2.0 and primefaces2.0 correctly at runtime but on server startup weblogic is using his "in-built" JSF1.2 to read "primefaces-2.0.0.jar"(which has JSF2.0 .xsds) and bombs out .

Is there any way to force weblogic to read "primefaces-2.0.0.jar" correctly on server start up?.

Mar 9, 2010 9:13:28 AM com.sun.faces.config.AnnotationScanner processClasspath
SEVERE: Unable to process annotations for url, zip:C:/ORACLE/middleware/user_projects/domains/wls11_admin/servers/AdminServer/tmp/_WL_user/poc/jje3vo/war/WEB-INF/lib/primefaces-2.0.0.jar!/META-INF/faces-config.xml. Reason: java.io.FileNotFoundException: zip:C:/ORACLE/middleware/user_projects/domains/wls11_admin/servers/AdminServer/tmp/_WL_user/poc/jje3vo/war/WEB-INF/lib/primefaces-2.0.0.jar
Mar 9, 2010 9:13:28 AM com.sun.faces.config.AnnotationScanner processClasspath
SEVERE:
java.io.FileNotFoundException: zip:C:/ORACLE/middleware/user_projects/domains/wls11_admin/servers/AdminServer/tmp/_WL_user/poc/jje3vo/war/WEB-INF/lib/primefaces-2.0.0.jar
at weblogic.utils.zip.ZipURLConnection.connect(Handler.java:78)
at weblogic.utils.zip.ZipURLConnection.getInputStream(Handler.java:53)
at sun.net.www.protocol.jar.URLJarFile.retrieve(URLJarFile.java:195)
at sun.net.www.protocol.jar.URLJarFile.getJarFile(URLJarFile.java:50)
at sun.net.www.protocol.jar.JarFileFactory.get(JarFileFactory.java:78)
at sun.net.www.protocol.jar.JarURLConnection.connect(JarURLConnection.java:104)
at sun.net.www.protocol.jar.JarURLConnection.getJarFile(JarURLConnection.java:71)
at com.sun.faces.config.AnnotationScanner.processClasspath(AnnotationScanner.java:290)
at com.sun.faces.config.AnnotationScanner.getAnnotatedClasses(AnnotationScanner.java:215)
at com.sun.faces.config.ConfigManager$AnnotationScanTask.call(ConfigManager.java:765)
at com.sun.faces.config.ConfigManager$AnnotationScanTask.call(ConfigManager.java:736)
at java.util.concurrent.FutureTask$Sync.innerRun(FutureTask.java:303)
at java.util.concurrent.FutureTask.run(FutureTask.java:138)
at com.sun.faces.config.ConfigManager.initialize(ConfigManager.java:329)
at com.sun.faces.config.ConfigureListener.contextInitialized(ConfigureListener.java:223)
at weblogic.servlet.internal.EventsManager$FireContextListenerAction.run(EventsManager.java:481)
at weblogic.security.acl.internal.AuthenticatedSubject.doAs(AuthenticatedSubject.java:321)
at weblogic.security.service.SecurityManager.runAs(SecurityManager.java:121)
at weblogic.servlet.internal.EventsManager.notifyContextCreatedEvent(EventsManager.java:181)
at weblogic.servlet.internal.WebAppServletContext.preloadResources(WebAppServletContext.java:1801)
at weblogic.servlet.internal.WebAppServletContext.start(WebAppServletContext.java:3045)
at weblogic.servlet.internal.WebAppModule.startContexts(WebAppModule.java:1397)
at weblogic.servlet.internal.WebAppModule.start(WebAppModule.java:460)
at weblogic.application.internal.flow.ModuleStateDriver$3.next(ModuleStateDriver.java:425)
at weblogic.application.utils.StateMachineDriver.nextState(StateMachineDriver.java:83)
at weblogic.application.internal.flow.ModuleStateDriver.start(ModuleStateDriver.java:119)
at weblogic.application.internal.flow.ScopedModuleDriver.start(ScopedModuleDriver.java:200)
at weblogic.application.internal.flow.ModuleListenerInvoker.start(ModuleListenerInvoker.java:247)
at weblogic.application.internal.flow.ModuleStateDriver$3.next(ModuleStateDriver.java:425)
at weblogic.application.utils.StateMachineDriver.nextState(StateMachineDriver.java:83)
at weblogic.application.internal.flow.ModuleStateDriver.start(ModuleStateDriver.java:119)
at weblogic.application.internal.flow.StartModulesFlow.activate(StartModulesFlow.java:27)
at weblogic.application.internal.BaseDeployment$2.next(BaseDeployment.java:1267)
at weblogic.application.utils.StateMachineDriver.nextState(StateMachineDriver.java:83)
at weblogic.application.internal.BaseDeployment.activate(BaseDeployment.java:409)
at weblogic.application.internal.EarDeployment.activate(EarDeployment.java:54)
at weblogic.application.internal.DeploymentStateChecker.activate(DeploymentStateChecker.java:161)
at weblogic.deploy.internal.targetserver.AppContainerInvoker.activate(AppContainerInvoker.java:79)
at weblogic.deploy.internal.targetserver.BasicDeployment.activate(BasicDeployment.java:184)
at weblogic.deploy.internal.targetserver.BasicDeployment.activateFromServerLifecycle(BasicDeployment.java:361)
at weblogic.management.deploy.internal.DeploymentAdapter$1.doActivate(DeploymentAdapter.java:51)
at weblogic.management.deploy.internal.DeploymentAdapter.activate(DeploymentAdapter.java:196)
at weblogic.management.deploy.internal.AppTransition$2.transitionApp(AppTransition.java:30)
at weblogic.management.deploy.internal.ConfiguredDeployments.transitionApps(ConfiguredDeployments.java:233)
at weblogic.management.deploy.internal.ConfiguredDeployments.activate(ConfiguredDeployments.java:169)
at weblogic.management.deploy.internal.ConfiguredDeployments.deploy(ConfiguredDeployments.java:123)
at weblogic.management.deploy.internal.DeploymentServerService.resume(DeploymentServerService.java:173)
at weblogic.management.deploy.internal.DeploymentServerService.start(DeploymentServerService.java:89)
at weblogic.t3.srvr.SubsystemRequest.run(SubsystemRequest.java:64)
at weblogic.work.ExecuteThread.execute(ExecuteThread.java:201)
at weblogic.work.ExecuteThread.run(ExecuteThread.java:173)

[karan khosla]

I think except for the option to upgrade to a new version or applying a patchset there is a workaround that i tried and it worked for me.

Problem
It occurs because weblogic 10 is shipped with Mojarra JSF 1.2 and the version that we want to make it work is Mojarra JSF 2.0.

Solution
It's a simple fix. In weblogic there is a file called commEnv.bat/sh. If you are running windows edit the bat file, else if you are running Linux/Mac edit the sh file.

Search for PRE_CLASSPATH or WEBLOGIC_CLASSPATH and add a complete path to the jsf-api.jar, jsf-impl.jar before weblogic.jar and if you are using Primefaces, just append it afterwords. Restart the server, deploy your application make sure that jsf-api.jar and jsf-impl.jar are there in the lib folder, but you are now free to remove the primefaces jar as it is already loaded by weblogic at server start-up otherwise you will see the same error still your application won't break.

Hope this Helps!
cheers!
Posted the same solution here: http://forums.oracle.com/forums/thread.jspa?threadID=1043858&start=30&tstart=0