Connecting through Data Source using JNDI

Question

I would like to connect my application to sql server database through data
source using JNDI. But when i try to bind the data source object with the
logical name, i am getting following exception. How can i ger rid of this
error ? How can i provide the initial context ? I thought Java would create the default initial context by itself. But it doesn't seem to be true. Any type of help would be appreciated.
-Prashant
Exception :
Naming Exception :Need to specify class name in environment or system
property, or as an applet parameter, or in an application resource file:
java.naming.factory.initial
javax.naming.NoInitialContextException: Need to specify class name in
environment or system property, or as an applet parameter, or in an
application resource file: java.naming.factory.initial
at javax.naming.spi.NamingManager.getInitialContext(NamingManager.java:651)
at javax.naming.InitialContext.getDefaultInitCtx(InitialContext.java:246)
at
javax.naming.InitialContext.getURLOrDefaultInitCtx(InitialContext.java:283)
at javax.naming.InitialContext.bind(InitialContext.java:358)
at RegDataSource.regDataSource(RegDataSource.java:30)
at RegDataSource.main(RegDataSource.java:52)
Source code :
public class RegDataSource
public RegDataSource()
private void regDataSource()
try
com.microsoft.jdbcx.sqlserver.SQLServerDataSource sds =
new
com.microsoft.jdbcx.sqlserver.SQLServerDataSource();
sds.setServerName("servername13");
sds.setDatabaseName("test");
Context ctx = new InitialContext();
ctx.bind("jdbc/EmployeeDB", sds);
catch(NamingException e)
System.out.println("Naming Exception :" + e.getMessage()
//+ "\n" + e.getExplanation()
//+ "\n" + e.getResolvedObj()
//+ "\n" + e.getResolvedName()
e.printStackTrace();
catch(Exception e)
System.out.println("Exception :" + e.getMessage());
public static void main(String[] args)
RegDataSource regDataSource1 = new RegDataSource();
regDataSource1.regDataSource();

Answer 1

Thanks you very very much for your prompt reply and helping me out. I have following questions.
1) Now i am able to bind data source object to the logical name. But the problem is that whenever i try to look up the data source object by providing logical name (i.e. DataSource ds = (DataSource)ctx.lookup("jdbc/EmployeeDB") ), it returns always null. I don't know why it doesn't return the correct data source object ?
Following is the code used to bind datasource with the logical name
Hashtable env = new Hashtable();
env.put(Context.INITIAL_CONTEXT_FACTORY,
"com.sun.jndi.fscontext.RefFSContextFactory");
env.put(Context.PROVIDER_URL, "file:/TEMP/jndi");
Context ctx = new InitialContext(env);
//Properties p = new Properties();
//p.put(Context.INITIAL_CONTEXT_FACTORY,
// "com.sun.jndi.fscontext.RefFSContextFactory");
//Context ctx = new InitialContext(p);
ctx.bind("jdbc/EmployeeDB", sds);
Following is the code used to look up for the bound object
Hashtable env = new Hashtable();
env.put(Context.INITIAL_CONTEXT_FACTORY,
"com.sun.jndi.fscontext.RefFSContextFactory");
env.put(Context.PROVIDER_URL, "file:/TEMP/jndi");
Context ctx = new InitialContext(env);
DataSource ds = (DataSource)ctx.lookup("jdbc/EmployeeDB");
2) I am writing client server application in which my client is going to access the SQL Server 2000 to read/write database related data. The reason behind using the JNDI is that i don't want my client application to kwon which driver (sql) and database i am using. It is going to provide the great flexibility whenever i can make my application to use other database like Oracel, sybase, etc. without changing any code most probably. In this situation, which JNDI service provider to use ? I am not sure about "File System" service provider be the ideal choice for this type of situation. so please let me know which JNDI service provider is the ideal for this situation.
Any type of help would be appreacited.