Getting request and creating HTTP response using Tomcat - apache

Question

I am currently trying to use embeded Tomcat for my application and am trying to set it up to get the URL of the http request.
Some Background:
I am using the same code as in the first answer for the post here : Howto embed Tomcat 6?
The only change I have made is :
private String catalinaHome = "/home/xyz/tomcat"; // This dir is created and has full access permissions
Also , I am looking at: http://tomcat.apache.org/tomcat-5.5-doc/catalina/docs/api/org/apache/catalina/startup/Embedded.html
There are no server.xml and tomcat-users.xml that I could find, so I created a tomcat-users.xml since I was getting an exception :Memory database file /home/xyz/tomcat/conf/tomcat-users.xml cannot be read .
tomcat-users.xml:
<?xml version='1.0' encoding='utf-8'?>
<tomcat-users>
<role rolename="tomcat"/>
<role rolename="role1"/>
<user username="tomcat" password="tomcat" roles="tomcat"/>
<user username="both" password="tomcat" roles="tomcat,role1"/>
<user username="role1" password="tomcat" roles="role1"/>
</tomcat-users>
The code uses container.setRealm(new MemoryRealm());
It appears from here : http://tomcat.apache.org/tomcat-4.1-doc/catalina/funcspecs/fs-memory-realm.html that I should have a server.xml file and there should already be one created by default.
1] Do I need to create a server.xml, what should be the default in it ?
I have put a file with default from here : http://www.akadia.com/download/soug/tomcat/html/tomcat_server_xml.html , but just want to know what is the right thing to do ?
2]When I access http://localhost:8089/mywebapp/index.html, all i get is The requested resource () is not available, though I have an index.html page at the "webappDir" in the code
3] My only need from the embedded tomcat is to intercept so as to get the URL passed to tomcat in my code. I can then parse the URL [do my stuff] and then create a http payload and send an http response back.
I would appreciate any pointers, especially for 3] ?
Thanks!

Answer 1

Ok, for your first question, yo do not need server.xml. If you check the code of your initial post they are setting the parameters there. So that is what server.xml would encapsulate. In reality what happens is that Tomcat will parse server.xml for the properties you are defining on your java file where you instanciate the catalina call to start. But since it is embedded you are setting all those parameters on you class instead.
For your second question, check your logs directory and see what is being parsed. Something is happening after your service starts because it should already redirect you once you call the port. either way, just try http://localhost:8089 and see what you get back in return from tomcat. It should give you some kind of response back from the server itself.
if you do it like this "http://localhost:8089/mywebapp/index.html" you are trying to access a created context, and that might not be configured correctly, but that is just a guess right now.
Try this first and tell me what you get back. we can troubleshoot from this point and see if I can help more in that sense.

Answer 2

Quick question, is this windows or linux you are installing on?
If it is linux the configurations filea are located usually on /etc/tomcat6. (at least on ubuntu they are). Reply back with the version you have installed. I might be able to help you out.
I guess I should also elaborate here a little more. Tomcat is a service in linux as well, so in ubuntu you have to start tomcat in order to access it.
$: sudo service tomcat6 start
then it starts tomcat on port 8080 (usually if not changed) of your localhost. hence you type localhost:8080 to access the website for configuration of tomcat that gives you a It works prompt for you.
Let me know if you have more questions, I will try to respond to the best of my knowledge