"cannot create jbcd driver of class " for connect URL 'null'" error

Question

I am trying to get an application that is currently working fine on a Windows platform to work in a Linux environment.
One thing that is different from my setup in Windows, and also one that I have no experience with, is the Linux-Ubuntu default install of Apache uses Virtual Hosts and Tomcat's equivalent multiple sessions.
I'm running the app out of the usr/share/tomcat6/webapps/msgboard instance of Tomcat vs var/lib/tomcat6.
I am calling the application from Apache Virtual Host port 80 using mod_jk. The application cannot run under native Tomcat because of the extensive use of PHP. Everything else in the application is working correctly including a DWR (Ajax) servlet. However I also tried a simple test app from native Tomcat and got the same results.
I also tried connecting with jdbc:mysql://localhost:3306/msgboard?autoreconnect=true&user=root&password=password at the terminal prompt and got
bash: jdbc:mysql://localhost/msgboard?autoreconnect=true: No such file or directory
[1]7074
[2] 7048
[1] Exit 127 jdbc:mysql://localhost/msgboard?autoreconnect=true
[2]+ Donesyslog error is
Feb 23, 2009 3:01:51 PM org.directwebremoting.util.CommonsLoggingOutput info INFO: Exec: Online.getPosts()
Feb 23 15:01:51 ubuntu jsvc.exec[6779]: org.apache.tomcat.dbcp.dbcp.SQLNestedException: Cannot create JDBC driver of class '' for connect URL 'null'
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Feb 23 15:01:51 ubuntu jsvc.exec[6779]: Caused by: java.sql.SQLException: No suitable driverFollowing is all the pertinent setup info for reference and critique. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
Apache2.2
Tomcat6
JDBC
mod_jk
Java (not sure what ver, it's the default Ubuntu install ver.)
PHP
Currently I am pointing to mysql-connector-java.jar in my CLASSPATH at /usr/share/java/mysql-connector-java.jar added symlinks commons-dbcp.jar, commons-logging.jar to usr/share/tomcat6/lib
Application is deployed from usr/share/tomcat6/webapps/msgboard
The basic code snippet in class calling the jdbc
WEB-INF/classes/dbLink.class
Context ctx = new InitialContext();
DataSource ds = (DataSource)ctx.lookup("java:comp/env/jdbc/msgboardDB");
WEB-INF/web.xml
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="ISO-8859-1"?>
<!DOCTYPE web-app PUBLIC "-//Sun Microsystems, Inc.//DTD Web Application 2.3//EN" "http://java.sun.com/dtd/web-app_2_3.dtd">
<web-app id="msgboard">
<display-name>Message Board</display-name>
<resource-ref>
<description>DB Connection</description>
<res-ref-name>jdbc/msgboardDB</res-ref-name>
<res-type>javax.sql.DataSource</res-type>
<res-auth>Container</res-auth>
</resource-ref>
</web-app>
META-INF/context.xml
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="ISO-8859-1"?>
<Context path="/msgboard" docBase="msgboard"
debug="5" reloadable="true" crossContext="true">
<Resource name="jdbc/msgboardDB"
auth="Container"
type="javax.sql.DataSource"
maxActive="100"
maxIdle="30"
maxWait="10000"
username="root"
password="thePassword"
driverClassName="com.mysql.jdbc.Driver"
url="jdbc:mysql://localhost:3306/msgboard?autoReconnect=true"/>
</Context>
I also included a symlink to this in var/lib/tomcat6/config named msgboard.xml
per instruction at http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=430133 and have since removed it.
my.cnf
[client]
port = 3306
bind-address = 127.0.0.1
permissions set in /etc/tomcat6/policy.d/04webapps.policy
permission java.net.SocketPermission "127.0.0.1:3306", "connect,resolve,listen,accept";
per instruction at http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=430133
other permiissions set /etc/tomcat6/policy.d/50local.policy
grant codeBase "file:/usr/share/tomcat6/webapps/msgboard/-" {
permission java.net.SocketPermission "127.0.0.1:3306", "connect,resolve,listen,accept";
grant codeBase "file:/usr/share/tomcat6/webapps/msgboard/WEB-INF/classes/-" {
permission java.io.FilePermission "/usr/share/tomcat6/webapps/msgboard/WEB-INF/classes/logging.properties", "read";
grant codeBase "jar:file:/usr/share/tomcat6/webapps/msgboard/WEB-INF/lib/mysql-connector-java-5.1.6.jar!/-" {
permission java.net.SocketPermission "127.0.0.1:3306", "connect,resolve,listen,accept";
I even tried setting Tomcat Security to "no" per instruction at
http://webui.sourcelabs.com/ubuntu/mail/user/threads/Tomcat_connecting_to_MySQL_-Ubuntu8.10_Server.meta
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1034957&highlight=apache+tomcat+jdbc
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=66615
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=33601&highlight=java+mysql
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=430133
http://programminglinuxblog.blogspot.com/2008/03/connection-pooling-with-java-all.html
http://webui.sourcelabs.com/ubuntu/mail/user/threads/Tomcat_connecting_to_MySQL_-Ubuntu8.10_Server.meta

Answer 1

SOLUTION
I had to add
<Resource name="jdbc/webappDB"
     auth="Container"
     type="javax.sql.DataSource"
        maxActive="100"
     maxIdle="30"
     maxWait="10000"
        username="root"
     password="password"
     driverClassName="com.mysql.jdbc.Driver"
        url="jdbc:mysql://localhost:3306/webapp?autoReconnect=true"/>into /var/lib/tomcat6/conf/Catalina/localhost/ webapp.xml
Note: the above context file was created automatically after deploying the webapp. I had to add the <resource> to it.
The context I created in usr/share/tomcat_home/webapp/META_INF/context.xml is still there and has the same <resource>.defined in it. I did not verify whether or not it still needs to be there.
After that I had to add two policies
/var/lib/tomcat6/conf/policy.d/03catalina.policy
grant {
permission java.lang.RuntimePermission "accessClassInPackage.org.apache.tomcat.dbcp.*";
and 04webapps.policy
permission java.net.SocketPermission "127.0.0.1:3306", "connect,resolve,listen,accept";
That did the trick!
Other things that were done but have not been verified as to have any bearing on this issue.
I changed the active java from openjdk to java-sun
I added $tomcat_home/lib:$tomcat_home/lib/mysql-connector.jar:$tomcat_home/lib/commons-dbcp.jar to PATH
Changed CLASSPATH=usr/share/classpath:usr/share/java/commons-dbcp.jar:usr/share/java/mysql-connector.jar
Edited by: wlbragg on Feb 25, 2009 12:58 AM
Edited by: wlbragg on Feb 25, 2009 12:59 AM
Edited by: wlbragg on Feb 25, 2009 1:11 AM