Get location of JAR file

Question

I'm trying to get the location a Runnable JAR file is run from. I tried doing

try {
    String path = new java.io.File(".").getCanonicalPath();
} catch (IOException e) {
    e.printStackTrace();
}

But that returns:

C:\Users\Kevin\Desktop/server/Server

while the JAR file is located at

C:\Users\Kevin\Desktop

I also tried doing

return new file(Server.class.getProtectionDomain().getCodeSource().getLocation().getPath());

But that returns:

C:\Users\Kevin\Desktop\server.jar/server/Server

So basicly I want the path of the JAR file without the filename and not the ClassPath.

Any way of doing this?

Answer 1

Update

Since it doesn't work in certain test-cases, I'll update the answer.

The correct way to do this should be with ClassLoader:

File jarDir = new File(ClassLoader.getSystemClassLoader().getResource(".").getPath());
System.out.println(jarDir.getAbsolutePath());

Tested on various classpaths, the output was correct.

---

Old answer

This should work

File f = new File(System.getProperty("java.class.path"));
File dir = f.getAbsoluteFile().getParentFile();
String path = dir.toString();

It works for me, my program is in:

C:\Users\User01\Documents\app1\dist\JavaApplication1.jar

And it returns

C:\Users\User01\Documents\app1\dist

Answer 2

Herewith my version of computing the jar directory

/**
 * Compute the absolute file path to the jar file.
 * The framework is based on http://stackoverflow.com/a/12733172/1614775
 * But that gets it right for only one of the four cases.
 * 
 * @param aclass A class residing in the required jar.
 * 
 * @return A File object for the directory in which the jar file resides.
 * During testing with NetBeans, the result is ./build/classes/,
 * which is the directory containing what will be in the jar.
 */
public static File getJarDir(Class aclass) {
    URL url;
    String extURL;      //  url.toExternalForm();

    // get an url
    try {
        url = aclass.getProtectionDomain().getCodeSource().getLocation();
          // url is in one of two forms
          //        ./build/classes/   NetBeans test
          //        jardir/JarName.jar  froma jar
    } catch (SecurityException ex) {
        url = aclass.getResource(aclass.getSimpleName() + ".class");
        // url is in one of two forms, both ending "/com/physpics/tools/ui/PropNode.class"
        //          file:/U:/Fred/java/Tools/UI/build/classes
        //          jar:file:/U:/Fred/java/Tools/UI/dist/UI.jar!
    }

    // convert to external form
    extURL = url.toExternalForm();

    // prune for various cases
    if (extURL.endsWith(".jar"))   // from getCodeSource
        extURL = extURL.substring(0, extURL.lastIndexOf("/"));
    else {  // from getResource
        String suffix = "/"+(aclass.getName()).replace(".", "/")+".class";
        extURL = extURL.replace(suffix, "");
        if (extURL.startsWith("jar:") && extURL.endsWith(".jar!"))
            extURL = extURL.substring(4, extURL.lastIndexOf("/"));
    }

    // convert back to url
    try {
        url = new URL(extURL);
    } catch (MalformedURLException mux) {
        // leave url unchanged; probably does not happen
    }

    // convert url to File
    try {
        return new File(url.toURI());
    } catch(URISyntaxException ex) {
        return new File(url.getPath());
    }
}