jar not loaded. See Servlet Spec 2.3, section 9.7.2. Offending class: javax/servlet/Servlet.class

Question

I am running a Maven project which is also a dynamic web project. I have used all Spring libraries in Maven. I created web.xml, but when I start my Tomcat 7 server I am getting the following message:

INFO: validateJarFile(C:\Users\mibvzd0\workspace\.metadata\.plugins\
org.eclipse.wst.server.core\tmp2\wtpwebapps\hapi_hl7\WEB-INF\lib\
servlet-api-2.4.jar) - jar not loaded.
See Servlet Spec 2.3, section 9.7.2. Offending class: javax/servlet/Servlet.class

I tried deleting the servlet from webapp/lib, but it didn't work. Let me know what should be done in my case.

Answer 1

The servlet API .jar file must not be embedded inside the webapp since, obviously, the container already has these classes in its classpath: it implements the interfaces contained in this jar.

The dependency should be in the provided scope, rather than the default compile scope, in your Maven pom:

<dependency>
    <groupId>javax.servlet</groupId>
    <artifactId>javax.servlet-api</artifactId>
    <version>3.1.0</version>
    <scope>provided</scope>
</dependency>

Answer 2

You get this warning message when the servlet api jar file has already been loaded in the container and you try to load it once again from lib directory.

The Servlet specs say you are not allowed to have servlet.jar in your webapps lib directory.

• Get rid of the warning message by simply removing servlet.jar from your lib directory.
• If you don't find the jar in the lib directory scan for your build path and remove the jar.

---

C:\Program Files\Apache Software Foundation\Tomcat 7.0\webapps\project\WEB-INF\lib

If you are running a maven project, change the javax.servlet-api dependency to scope provided in you pom.xml since the container already provided the servlet jar in itself.

Answer 3

To fix it, set the scope to provided. This tells Maven use code servlet-api.jar for compiling and testing only, but NOT include it in the WAR file. The deployed container will “provide” the servlet-api.jar at runtime.

<dependency>
    <groupId>javax.servlet</groupId>
    <artifactId>servlet-api</artifactId>
    <version>2.5</version>
    <scope>provided</scope>
</dependency>