How does Tomcat locate webapps directory? Where is this location set? Is it a relative directory?
This question is related to
tomcat
It can be changed in the $CATALINA_BASE/conf/server.xml in the <Host />. See the Tomcat documentation, specifically the section in regards to the Host container:
The default is webapps relative to the $CATALINA_BASE. An absolute pathname can be used.
Hope that helps.
Change appBase in server.xml
If you want to keep both previous webapps and a new one, you can use another Host instance with another port defined in tomcat.
Find server.xml at $CATALINA_BASE/conf/server.xml
Find appBase attribute in <Host> element
by default it will be something like :
<Host name="localhost" appBase="webapps ...>
Change appBase to your required path. There are different way people put it, but I use
/c:/myfolder/newwebapps
Remember, no slash at the end, but at start. Also note it's direction as well.
I'm using Tomcat through XAMPP which might have been the cause of this problem. When I changed appBase="C:/Java Project/", for example, I kept getting "This localhost page can't be found" in the browser.
I had to add a folder called ROOT inside the Java Project folder and then it worked. Any files you're working on have to be inside this ROOT folder but you need to leave appBase="C:/Java Project/" as changing it to appBase="C:/Java Project/ROOT" will cause "This localhost page can't be found" to be displayed again.
Maybe needing the ROOT folder is obvious to more experienced Java developers but it wasn't for me so hopefully this helps anyone else encountering the same problem.
Source: Stackoverflow.com