Apache Tomcat cannot load web.xml - Connection timed out

Question

If I try to deploy a webapp in Tomcat I get an exception. The web.xml seems correct to me so the problem should be somewhere else. Any help would be appreciated...

web.xml

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE web-app PUBLIC "-//Sun Microsystems, Inc.//DTD Web Application 2.4//EN" "http://java.sun.com/dtd/web-app_2_4.dtd">
<web-app>
    <context-param>
    <param-name>contextConfigLocation</param-name>
    <param-value>WEB-INF/applicationContext.xml</param-value>
</context-param>
    <listener>
        <listener-class>org.springframework.web.context.ContextLoaderListener</listener-class>
    </listener>
    <servlet>
        <servlet-name>httpServer</servlet-name>
    <display-name>HttpServer</display-name>
    <servlet-class>server.HttpServer</servlet-class>
    <load-on-startup>1</load-on-startup>
</servlet>
<servlet-mapping>
        <servlet-name>httpServer</servlet-name>
    <url-pattern>/*</url-pattern>
</servlet-mapping>
</web-app>

Exception

Jul 25, 2011 1:32:21 PM org.apache.catalina.startup.ContextConfig parseWebXml
SEVERE: Parse error in application web.xml file at jndi:/localhost/mmscfake/WEB-INF/web.xml
java.net.ConnectException: Connection timed out
    at java.net.PlainSocketImpl.socketConnect(Native Method)
    at java.net.PlainSocketImpl.doConnect(PlainSocketImpl.java:333)
    at java.net.PlainSocketImpl.connectToAddress(PlainSocketImpl.java:195)
    at java.net.PlainSocketImpl.connect(PlainSocketImpl.java:182)
    at java.net.SocksSocketImpl.connect(SocksSocketImpl.java:366)
    at java.net.Socket.connect(Socket.java:525)
    at java.net.Socket.connect(Socket.java:475)
    at sun.net.NetworkClient.doConnect(NetworkClient.java:163)
    at sun.net.www.http.HttpClient.openServer(HttpClient.java:394)
    at sun.net.www.http.HttpClient.openServer(HttpClient.java:529)
    at sun.net.www.http.HttpClient.<init>(HttpClient.java:233)
    at sun.net.www.http.HttpClient.New(HttpClient.java:306)
    at sun.net.www.http.HttpClient.New(HttpClient.java:323)
    at sun.net.www.protocol.http.HttpURLConnection.getNewHttpClient(HttpURLConnection.java:860)
    at sun.net.www.protocol.http.HttpURLConnection.plainConnect(HttpURLConnection.java:801)
    at sun.net.www.protocol.http.HttpURLConnection.connect(HttpURLConnection.java:726)
    at sun.net.www.protocol.http.HttpURLConnection.getInputStream(HttpURLConnection.java:1049)
    at com.sun.org.apache.xerces.internal.impl.XMLEntityManager.setupCurrentEntity(XMLEntityManager.java:677)
    at com.sun.org.apache.xerces.internal.impl.XMLEntityManager.startEntity(XMLEntityManager.java:1315)
    at com.sun.org.apache.xerces.internal.impl.XMLEntityManager.startDTDEntity(XMLEntityManager.java:1282)
    at com.sun.org.apache.xerces.internal.impl.XMLDTDScannerImpl.setInputSource(XMLDTDScannerImpl.java:283)
    at com.sun.org.apache.xerces.internal.impl.XMLDocumentScannerImpl$DTDDriver.dispatch(XMLDocumentScannerImpl.java:1193)
    at com.sun.org.apache.xerces.internal.impl.XMLDocumentScannerImpl$DTDDriver.next(XMLDocumentScannerImpl.java:1090)
    at com.sun.org.apache.xerces.internal.impl.XMLDocumentScannerImpl$PrologDriver.next(XMLDocumentScannerImpl.java:1003)
    at com.sun.org.apache.xerces.internal.impl.XMLDocumentScannerImpl.next(XMLDocumentScannerImpl.java:648)
    at com.sun.org.apache.xerces.internal.impl.XMLDocumentFragmentScannerImpl.scanDocument(XMLDocumentFragmentScannerImpl.java:510)
    at com.sun.org.apache.xerces.internal.parsers.XML11Configuration.parse(XML11Configuration.java:807)
    at com.sun.org.apache.xerces.internal.parsers.XML11Configuration.parse(XML11Configuration.java:737)
    at com.sun.org.apache.xerces.internal.parsers.XMLParser.parse(XMLParser.java:107)
    at com.sun.org.apache.xerces.internal.parsers.AbstractSAXParser.parse(AbstractSAXParser.java:1205)
    at com.sun.org.apache.xerces.internal.jaxp.SAXParserImpl$JAXPSAXParser.parse(SAXParserImpl.java:522)
    at org.apache.tomcat.util.digester.Digester.parse(Digester.java:1543)
    at org.apache.catalina.startup.ContextConfig.parseWebXml(ContextConfig.java:1694)
    at org.apache.catalina.startup.ContextConfig.webConfig(ContextConfig.java:1209)
    at org.apache.catalina.startup.ContextConfig.configureStart(ContextConfig.java:882)
    at org.apache.catalina.startup.ContextConfig.lifecycleEvent(ContextConfig.java:317)
    at org.apache.catalina.util.LifecycleSupport.fireLifecycleEvent(LifecycleSupport.java:119)
    at org.apache.catalina.util.LifecycleBase.fireLifecycleEvent(LifecycleBase.java:89)
    at org.apache.catalina.core.StandardContext.startInternal(StandardContext.java:5081)
    at org.apache.catalina.util.LifecycleBase.start(LifecycleBase.java:145)
    at org.apache.catalina.core.ContainerBase.addChildInternal(ContainerBase.java:812)
    at org.apache.catalina.core.ContainerBase.addChild(ContainerBase.java:787)
    at org.apache.catalina.core.StandardHost.addChild(StandardHost.java:607)
    at org.apache.catalina.startup.HostConfig.deployWAR(HostConfig.java:932)
    at org.apache.catalina.startup.HostConfig.deployApps(HostConfig.java:529)
    at org.apache.catalina.startup.HostConfig.check(HostConfig.java:1377)
    at sun.reflect.NativeMethodAccessorImpl.invoke0(Native Method)
    at sun.reflect.NativeMethodAccessorImpl.invoke(NativeMethodAccessorImpl.java:39)
    at sun.reflect.DelegatingMethodAccessorImpl.invoke(DelegatingMethodAccessorImpl.java:25)
    at java.lang.reflect.Method.invoke(Method.java:597)
    at org.apache.tomcat.util.modeler.BaseModelMBean.invoke(BaseModelMBean.java:297)
    at com.sun.jmx.interceptor.DefaultMBeanServerInterceptor.invoke(DefaultMBeanServerInterceptor.java:836)
    at com.sun.jmx.mbeanserver.JmxMBeanServer.invoke(JmxMBeanServer.java:761)
    at org.apache.catalina.manager.ManagerServlet.check(ManagerServlet.java:1422)
    at org.apache.catalina.manager.HTMLManagerServlet.upload(HTMLManagerServlet.java:332)
    at org.apache.catalina.manager.HTMLManagerServlet.doPost(HTMLManagerServlet.java:209)
    at javax.servlet.http.HttpServlet.service(HttpServlet.java:641)
    at javax.servlet.http.HttpServlet.service(HttpServlet.java:722)
    at org.apache.catalina.core.ApplicationFilterChain.internalDoFilter(ApplicationFilterChain.java:304)
    at org.apache.catalina.core.ApplicationFilterChain.doFilter(ApplicationFilterChain.java:210)
    at org.apache.catalina.filters.CsrfPreventionFilter.doFilter(CsrfPreventionFilter.java:187)
    at org.apache.catalina.core.ApplicationFilterChain.internalDoFilter(ApplicationFilterChain.java:243)
    at org.apache.catalina.core.ApplicationFilterChain.doFilter(ApplicationFilterChain.java:210)
    at org.apache.catalina.core.StandardWrapperValve.invoke(StandardWrapperValve.java:240)
    at org.apache.catalina.core.StandardContextValve.invoke(StandardContextValve.java:164)
    at org.apache.catalina.authenticator.AuthenticatorBase.invoke(AuthenticatorBase.java:576)
    at org.apache.catalina.core.StandardHostValve.invoke(StandardHostValve.java:164)
    at org.apache.catalina.valves.ErrorReportValve.invoke(ErrorReportValve.java:100)
    at org.apache.catalina.valves.AccessLogValve.invoke(AccessLogValve.java:562)
    at org.apache.catalina.core.StandardEngineValve.invoke(StandardEngineValve.java:118)
    at org.apache.catalina.connector.CoyoteAdapter.service(CoyoteAdapter.java:395)
    at org.apache.coyote.http11.Http11Processor.process(Http11Processor.java:250)
    at org.apache.coyote.http11.Http11Protocol$Http11ConnectionHandler.process(Http11Protocol.java:188)
    at org.apache.tomcat.util.net.JIoEndpoint$SocketProcessor.run(JIoEndpoint.java:302)
    at java.util.concurrent.ThreadPoolExecutor$Worker.runTask(ThreadPoolExecutor.java:886)
    at java.util.concurrent.ThreadPoolExecutor$Worker.run(ThreadPoolExecutor.java:908)
    at java.lang.Thread.run(Thread.java:619)

Answer 1

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE web-app PUBLIC "-//Sun Microsystems, Inc.//DTD Web Application 2.4//EN" "http://java.sun.com/dtd/web-app_2_4.dtd">
<web-app>
    ...

That's not the right Servlet 2.4 web.xml root declaration. It look like you took a Servlet 2.3 or older one which is based on a DTD and just changed the version number. That's not correct. From Servlet 2.4 on a XSD is been used instead of DTD.

The right Servlet 2.4 web.xml root declaration look like this

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<web-app
    xmlns="http://java.sun.com/xml/ns/j2ee"
    xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
    xsi:schemaLocation="http://java.sun.com/xml/ns/j2ee http://java.sun.com/xml/ns/j2ee/web-app_2_4.xsd"
    version="2.4">
    ...