Wanted Global parameter!!!

Question

Hi All,
We would like to store global parameters in the web.xml file or by other means in a central file, that can be accessed by any JavaBean, JSP, etc.
How can we do that, and what are the methods utilised to retrieve these parameters and use in JavaBeans, jsps, CustomTags, etc.
We have several jsp pages that are used to connect to a database and retrieve records. At the moment, we have hard-coded the:
a) IP address for the server;
b) jdbc driver name
c) path of the database server;
d) user name for the database connection;
e) password for the database connection.
Our intention is to centrally store this information, and then retrieve whenever we need.
Thanks in advance for any help.
Cheers
Trajano Roberto

Answer 1

from J2EE spec:
"a set of context initialization parameter can be associated with a web application and are made available by the following methods of the ServletContext interface :
getInitParameter
getInitParameterNames"
now from tomcat's basic web.xml file ( replace > by > to make it correct ) :
   <!-- Context initialization parameters that define shared
         String constants used within your application, which
         can be customized by the system administrator who is
         installing your application.  The values actually
         assigned to these parameters can be retrieved in a
         servlet or JSP page by calling:
             String value =
               getServletContext().getInitParameter("name");
         where "name" matches the <param-name> element of
         one of these initialization parameters.
         You can define any number of context initialization
         parameters, including zero.
    -->
    <context-param>
      <param-name>webmaster</param-name>
      <param-value>[email protected]</param-value>
      <description>
        The EMAIL address of the administrator to whom questions
        and comments about this application should be addressed.
      </description>
    </context-param>you'll find this file at the following address :
http://jakarta.apache.org/tomcat/tomcat-3.3-doc/appdev/web.xml.txt
hope it helps
raphaele