Java Signing issues when loading web start app

Question

Hey, not sure if this is the correct place for this - but couldn't think where else to put it...
I'm a bit stuck at the moment and i wondered if anyone could shed some light on my problem, and where I might go from here.
We've developed a EJB3 application that has a web start UI for users to start... The application is developed in Eclipse and compiled and deployed with ant build scripts... When we deploy the application from within Eclipse everything runs smoothly and users are able to start the web start app without any problems... However I've recently tried setting up a Continuous Integration server (Hudson) for us to test new deploys on and for this our build scripts need to be run outside of Eclipse...
This appears to run without a problem, however each time the system is deployed from here the web start application fails to start because web start cannot verify the signing in the client jar
Could not verify signing in resource: http://10.39.216.5:8080/mist2/lib/mist2-client.jarAs far as I can tell from the output of the build everything goes according to plan and there is little difference between the output if the build had been started in eclipse... The only big difference is that when building in Eclipse the build only packs up the compiled code, because Eclipse auto build the application, whereas in Hudson the code is clean built using the ant scripts (which are created by Eclipse)... and if I turn autobuild off eclipse and build the project from scratch using only the build scripts then the same problem arises...
I'm not really an expert on jar signing so I can't really guess at what might cause the verification to fail... any hints would be much appreciated. It feels like there is something that the Eclipse compiler does that is missing from the scripts but I can't think what this might be as the scripts are created in Eclipse
Thanks
Alex

Answer 1

Alex,
I believe your problem might be similar to one I had. According to one forum response (of course I can't find it now), if you have third-party JARs in your application (which in your case would be any eclipse jars), they might already be signed by their originators (as are eclipse jars), which may cause some really strange errors.
The solution for me was to package my third-party (that is, eclipse) jars into their own feature, separate from my application's feature. So, my main jnlp file has an extension to my application's feature jnlp, and that feature's jnlp file has an extension to yet another jnlp file containing the list of third-party (eclipse) jars. Of course, your jar list will probably be different than mine.
Here's all three files. Hope this helps!!
Calvin.jnlp (the main jnlp file):
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<jnlp
spec="1.0+"
codebase="http://bet/ERS"
href="calvin.jnlp">
<information>
<title>ERS</title>
<vendor>NIAT</vendor>
<homepage href="http://niat.net"/>
<description>Electronic Record System</description>
<icon href="icon.jpg"/>
<icon kind="splash" href="splash.jpg"/>
</information>
<security>
<all-permissions/>
</security>
<resources>
<j2se version="1.6+" max-heap-size="256m"/>
<jar href="org.eclipse.equinox.launcher_1.0.101.R34x_v20080819.jar" main="true"/>
<extension
name="Calvin Feature"
href="features/net.niat.calvin.feature.jnlp"/>
<property
name="osgi.instance.area"
value="@user.home/Application Data/calvin"/>
<property
name="osgi.configuration.area"
value="@user.home/Application Data/calvin"/>
<property
name="eclipse.product"
value="net.niat.calvin.product"/>
</resources>
<application-desc main-class="org.eclipse.equinox.launcher.WebStartMain">
<argument>-nosplash</argument>
</application-desc>
</jnlp>
net.niat.calvin.feature.jnlp (the extension's jnlp):
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<jnlp spec="1.0+" codebase="http://bet/ERS">
<information>
<title>ERS</title>
<vendor>NIAT</vendor>
</information>
<resources>
<jar href="../plugins/net.niat.calvin_@[email protected]"/>
<extension name="RCP" href="org.eclipse.rcp_3.4.1.jnlp"/>
</resources>
<component-desc></component-desc>
</jnlp>
org.eclipse.rcp_3.4.1.jnlp (the repackaged eclipse files jar feature):
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<jnlp spec="1.0+" codebase="$$codebase">
<information>
<title>Eclipse</title>
<vendor>eclipse.org</vendor>
</information>
<resources>
<jar href="../plugins/org.eclipse.core.commands_3.4.0.I20080509-2000.jar"/>
<jar href="../plugins/net.niat.calvin_2.6.2.11.jar"/>
<jar href="../plugins/org.eclipse.core.commands_3.4.0.I20080509-2000.jar"/>
<jar href="../plugins/org.eclipse.core.contenttype_3.3.0.v20080604-1400.jar"/>
<jar href="../plugins/org.eclipse.core.databinding_1.1.1.M20080827-0800b.jar"/>
<jar href="../plugins/org.eclipse.core.expressions_3.4.0.v20080603-2000.jar"/>
<jar href="../plugins/org.eclipse.core.jobs_3.4.0.v20080512.jar"/>
<jar href="../plugins/org.eclipse.core.runtime.compatibility_3.2.0.v20071008.jar"/>
<jar href="../plugins/org.eclipse.core.runtime_3.4.0.v20080512.jar"/>
<jar href="../plugins/org.eclipse.equinox.app_1.1.0.v20080421-2006.jar"/>
<jar href="../plugins/org.eclipse.equinox.common_3.4.0.v20080421-2006.jar"/>
<jar href="../plugins/org.eclipse.equinox.preferences_3.2.201.R34x_v20080709.jar"/>
<jar href="../plugins/org.eclipse.equinox.registry_3.4.0.v20080516-0950.jar"/>
<jar href="../plugins/org.eclipse.help_3.3.101.v20080702_34x.jar"/>
<jar href="../plugins/org.eclipse.jface.databinding_1.2.1.M20080827-0800a.jar"/>
<jar href="../plugins/org.eclipse.jface_3.4.1.M20080827-2000.jar"/>
<jar href="../plugins/org.eclipse.osgi_3.4.2.R34x_v20080826-1230.jar"/>
<jar href="../plugins/org.eclipse.swt.win32.win32.x86.source_3.4.1.v3449c.jar"/>
<jar href="../plugins/org.eclipse.swt_3.4.1.v3449c.jar"/>
<jar href="../plugins/org.eclipse.ui.forms_3.3.101.v20080708_34x.jar"/>
<jar href="../plugins/org.eclipse.ui.workbench_3.4.1.M20080827-0800a.jar"/>
<jar href="../plugins/org.eclipse.ui_3.4.1.M20080910-0800.jar"/>
<jar href="../plugins/runtime_registry_compatibility.jar"/>
</resources>
<component-desc></component-desc>
</jnlp>