Apache cxf on wls 10.3

Question

I have created an ear for wls using apache cxf 2.2 for web services.
It deploys and works properly on my development machine, windows & jdk 1.6
However when I try to get it to run in my production environment starting the application
fails with the stacktrace below. Production system is RHEL5 x86_64 with jdk 1.6.0_10
I'm at a loss on how to even start troubleshooting this.
Any help is much appreciated
weblogic-application.xml
<prefer-application-packages>
<package-name>antlr.*</package-name>
<package-name>javax.jws.*</package-name>
<package-name>javax.namespace.xml.*</package-name>
<package-name>javax.xml.soap.*</package-name>
</prefer-application-packages>
weblogic.xml
<container-descriptor>
<prefer-web-inf-classes>false</prefer-web-inf-classes>
</container-descriptor>
####<Apr 27, 2009 1:35:56 PM PDT> <Warning> <HTTP> <r01dvrappx01.r01.med.va.gov> <llvamc-web> <STANDBY ExecuteThread: '3' for queue: 'weblogic.kernel.Defau
lt (self-tuning)'> <<WLS Kernel>> <1240864556825> <BEA-101162> <User defined listener org.springframework.web.context.ContextLoaderListener failed: org
.springframework.beans.factory.BeanCreationException: Error creating bean with name 'wsPerformanceMeasureService': Invocation of init method failed; nested e
xception is java.lang.LinkageError: loader constraint violation: loader (instance of weblogic/utils/classloaders/GenericClassLoader) previously initiated loa
ding for a different type with name "javax/xml/soap/MessageFactory".
org.springframework.beans.factory.BeanCreationException: Error creating bean with name 'wsPerformanceMeasureService': Invocation of init method failed; neste
d exception is java.lang.LinkageError: loader constraint violation: loader (instance of weblogic/utils/classloaders/GenericClassLoader) previously initiated
loading for a different type with name "javax/xml/soap/MessageFactory"
at org.springframework.beans.factory.support.AbstractAutowireCapableBeanFactory.initializeBean(AbstractAutowireCapableBeanFactory.java:1337)
at org.springframework.beans.factory.support.AbstractAutowireCapableBeanFactory.doCreateBean(AbstractAutowireCapableBeanFactory.java:473)
at org.springframework.beans.factory.support.AbstractAutowireCapableBeanFactory$1.run(AbstractAutowireCapableBeanFactory.java:409)
at java.security.AccessController.doPrivileged(Native Method)

Answer 1

After research by Oracle Support it actually turns out that this problem was a combination of factors:
1) some clients were effectively using an invalid certificate so it is corrrect they got an error and everything worked fine when they started using the right certificate
2) it does, however, turn out that, in the case of an error the error handling has been obfuscated in WLS 10.3.6 as compared to WLS 10.3.4 which gives a more descriptive error stating the nature of the problem (missing certificate, invalid certificate, unknown user, ...). Apparently this was deemed a security issue and has thus been replaced by a generic "internal server error". It is however possible to re-activate this older behaviour using a couple of JAVA_OPTS that you pass during server startup:
-Dweblogic.wsee.security.debug=true -Dweblogic.wsee.security.verbose=true
The above reintroduced the behaviour we had in WLS 10.3.4 and thus solves our problem!