How can I make a ServletContextListener stop the Java EE application?

servlets jakarta-ee servlet-listeners
Freiheit picture Freiheit · Jul 12, 2011 · Viewed 8.7k times · Source

I have a ServletContextListener which performs some database management functions when my Java EE application starts. This runs in my application before JPA and other pieces of the application are started/loaded. If the database maintenance fails I am logging the errors. If the database maintenance fails the application will not function properly and I would like to halt the application.

How can I gracefully and correctly stop the application from ServletContextListener.contextInitialized?

Solution given by Viven below is close but not quite. When I throw a RuntimeException Glassfish is left in an inconsistent state where its admin console is not accessible but some process is still running and keeping port 3700 (IIOP?) open which then prevents a restart.

Answer

Vivien Barousse picture Vivien Barousse · Jul 12, 2011

If your ServletContextListener throws an exception, the webapp won't load correctly and the application server may block all subsequent request (and respond with a 500 error).

It isn't exactly preventing the application to start, nor stopping the application, but it prevents any further usage of the app and could be useful in your case.

After proper verification in the spec, this behaviour isn't mandatory in the specification. The server may (not must) return 500 errors. This solution has to be used carefully, therefore.

See this Answer for a quote from the Servlet spec.

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