Access file inside WebContent from servlet

Question

I trying to access the html files inside the WebContent/alerts folder using its relative path from servlet. But i unable to access it using its relative path,

Access the file inside WebContent from Servlet using relative path:

protected Element getSummary(String value) throws IOException
{
    Element element=null;
    Summary summary = Summary.valueOf(value);
    switch(summary) {
    case rtp_summary:
        element=parseDIV(new File("../../WebContent/alerts/rtp_bcklg_mail.html"),"rtp_summary");
        break;
    case ffu_summary:
        element=parseDIV(new File("/../../WebContent/alerts/ffu_comp_bcklg_mail.html"),"ffu_summary");
        break;    
    default:
        System.out.println("Enter a valid choice");
        break;
    }
    return element;
}

Access the file inside WebContent from Java Thread using relative path:

 public class WriteJSONFile implements Runnable{

WriteJSONFile(){
}

@Override

public void run()
{
    try {
        createJSONFile();
    } catch (IOException e) {

        e.printStackTrace();
    }
}

@SuppressWarnings("unchecked")
private static void createJSONFile() throws IOException
{
    String path="C:/Users/Thiru/Documents/Website Design/Macaw/";
    JSONArray jsonArray=new JSONArray();
    JSONObject rtpStatus=new JSONObject();
    rtpStatus.put("name","RTP");
    rtpStatus.put("status",parseDIV(new File(path+"WebContent/alerts/rtp_bcklg_mail.html"),"rtp_health"));
    jsonArray.add(rtpStatus);

    JSONObject proposalattribStatus=new JSONObject();
    proposalattribStatus.put("name","PROPOSAL ATTRIBUTE");
    proposalattribStatus.put("status",parseDIV(new File(path+"WebContent/alerts/prpsl_txtsrch.html"),"prpsl_attrb_health"));
    jsonArray.add(proposalattribStatus);

    writetoFile(jsonArray);
}


private static void writetoFile(JSONArray jsonArray) {
    try {
        String path="C:/Users/Thiru/Documents/Website Design/Macaw/";
        FileWriter file = new FileWriter(path+"WebContent/properties/status.json");
        file.write(jsonArray.toJSONString());
        file.flush();
        file.close();

    } catch (IOException e) {
        e.printStackTrace();
    }   
}

protected static String parseDIV(File input, String divElement)
        throws IOException {
    Document doc = Jsoup.parse(input, "UTF-8");
    String content = doc.getElementById(divElement).val();
    System.out.println(divElement +" "+content);
    return content;
}

}

And i also want to access the files inside Webcontent from RESTful web service method using relative path. Thanks in advance.

Solution

Use ServletContext.getRealPath() to locate the file on disk. Note that this only works if the webapp is "exploded" during deployment.

For example:

   File f = new File(getServletContext().getRealPath("alerts/rtp_bcklg_mail.html"));