java.lang.NoClassDefFoundError: com.sun.org.apache.commons.beanutils.PropertyUtils

Question

i am trying to use apache commons collections and predicate as follows:

List<Cat> bigList = ....; // master list

Collection<Cat> smallList = CollectionUtils.select(bigList, new Predicate() {
    public boolean evaluate(Object o) {
        Cat c = (Cat)o;
        return c.getFavoriteFood().equals("Wiskas") 
            && c.getWhateverElse().equals(Something);
    }
});

and the jars I have in my classpath are:

commons-beanutils-1.8.3.jar
commons-collections-3.1.jar
commons-logging-1.1.jar

but in runtime I get the following exception:

java.lang.NoClassDefFoundError: com.sun.org.apache.commons.beanutils.PropertyUtils
                                 javax.faces.el.EvaluationException: java.lang.NoClassDefFoundError: com.sun.org.apache.commons.beanutils.PropertyUtils
    at javax.faces.component.MethodBindingMethodExpressionAdapter.invoke(MethodBindingMethodExpressionAdapter.java:108)
    at com.sun.faces.application.ActionListenerImpl.processAction(ActionListenerImpl.java:102)
    at com.sun.rave.web.ui.appbase.faces.ActionListenerImpl.processAction(ActionListenerImpl.java:91)
    at javax.faces.component.UICommand.broadcast(UICommand.java:387)
    at javax.faces.component.UIViewRoot.broadcastEvents(UIViewRoot.java:458)
    at javax.faces.component.UIViewRoot.processApplication(UIViewRoot.java:763)
    at com.sun.faces.lifecycle.InvokeApplicationPhase.execute(InvokeApplicationPhase.java:82)
    at com.sun.faces.lifecycle.Phase.doPhase(Phase.java:100)
    at com.sun.faces.lifecycle.LifecycleImpl.execute(LifecycleImpl.java:118)
    at javax.faces.webapp.FacesServlet.service(FacesServlet.java:265)
    at com.ibm.ws.webcontainer.servlet.ServletWrapper.service(ServletWrapper.java:1657)
    at com.ibm.ws.webcontainer.servlet.ServletWrapper.service(ServletWrapper.java:1597)
    at com.ibm.ws.webcontainer.filter.WebAppFilterChain.doFilter(WebAppFilterChain.java:131)
    at com.sun.rave.web.ui.util.UploadFilter.doFilter(UploadFilter.java:225)
    at com.ibm.ws.webcontainer.filter.FilterInstanceWrapper.doFilter(FilterInstanceWrapper.java:188)
    at com.ibm.ws.webcontainer.filter.WebAppFilterChain.doFilter(WebAppFilterChain.java:116)
    at com.filenet.ae.toolkit.server.servlet.filter.PostprocessorFilter.doFilter(PostprocessorFilter.java:38)
    at com.ibm.ws.webcontainer.filter.FilterInstanceWrapper.doFilter(FilterInstanceWrapper.java:188)
    at com.ibm.ws.webcontainer.filter.WebAppFilterChain.doFilter(WebAppFilterChain.java:116)
    at com.filenet.ae.toolkit.server.servlet.filter.ContainerBasedFilter.doFilter(ContainerBasedFilter.java:218)
    at com.ibm.ws.webcontainer.filter.FilterInstanceWrapper.doFilter(FilterInstanceWrapper.java:188)
    at com.ibm.ws.webcontainer.filter.WebAppFilterChain.doFilter(WebAppFilterChain.java:116)
    at com.filenet.ae.toolkit.server.servlet.filter.PreprocessorFilter.doFilter(PreprocessorFilter.java:91)
    at com.ibm.ws.webcontainer.filter.FilterInstanceWrapper.doFilter(FilterInstanceWrapper.java:188)
    at com.ibm.ws.webcontainer.filter.WebAppFilterChain.doFilter(WebAppFilterChain.java:116)
    at com.filenet.ae.toolkit.server.servlet.filter.ThreadLocalCleanupFilter.doFilter(ThreadLocalCleanupFilter.java:50)
    at com.ibm.ws.webcontainer.filter.FilterInstanceWrapper.doFilter(FilterInstanceWrapper.java:188)
    at com.ibm.ws.webcontainer.filter.WebAppFilterChain.doFilter(WebAppFilterChain.java:116)
    at com.ibm.ws.webcontainer.filter.WebAppFilterChain._doFilter(WebAppFilterChain.java:77)
    at com.ibm.ws.webcontainer.filter.WebAppFilterManager.doFilter(WebAppFilterManager.java:908)
    at com.ibm.ws.webcontainer.servlet.ServletWrapper.handleRequest(ServletWrapper.java:934)
    at com.ibm.ws.webcontainer.servlet.ServletWrapper.handleRequest(ServletWrapper.java:502)
    at com.ibm.ws.webcontainer.servlet.ServletWrapperImpl.handleRequest(ServletWrapperImpl.java:179)
    at com.ibm.ws.webcontainer.servlet.CacheServletWrapper.handleRequest(CacheServletWrapper.java:91)
    at com.ibm.ws.webcontainer.WebContainer.handleRequest(WebContainer.java:864)
    at com.ibm.ws.webcontainer.WSWebContainer.handleRequest(WSWebContainer.java:1592)
    at com.ibm.ws.webcontainer.channel.WCChannelLink.ready(WCChannelLink.java:186)
    at com.ibm.ws.http.channel.inbound.impl.HttpInboundLink.handleDiscrimination(HttpInboundLink.java:452)
    at com.ibm.ws.http.channel.inbound.impl.HttpInboundLink.handleNewRequest(HttpInboundLink.java:511)
    at com.ibm.ws.http.channel.inbound.impl.HttpInboundLink.processRequest(HttpInboundLink.java:305)
    at com.ibm.ws.http.channel.inbound.impl.HttpInboundLink.ready(HttpInboundLink.java:276)
    at com.ibm.ws.tcp.channel.impl.NewConnectionInitialReadCallback.sendToDiscriminators(NewConnectionInitialReadCallback.java:214)
    at com.ibm.ws.tcp.channel.impl.NewConnectionInitialReadCallback.complete(NewConnectionInitialReadCallback.java:113)
    at com.ibm.ws.tcp.channel.impl.AioReadCompletionListener.futureCompleted(AioReadCompletionListener.java:165)
    at com.ibm.io.async.AbstractAsyncFuture.invokeCallback(AbstractAsyncFuture.java:217)
    at com.ibm.io.async.AsyncChannelFuture.fireCompletionActions(AsyncChannelFuture.java:161)
    at com.ibm.io.async.AsyncFuture.completed(AsyncFuture.java:138)
    at com.ibm.io.async.ResultHandler.complete(ResultHandler.java:204)
    at com.ibm.io.async.ResultHandler.runEventProcessingLoop(ResultHandler.java:775)
    at com.ibm.io.async.ResultHandler$2.run(ResultHandler.java:905)
    at com.ibm.ws.util.ThreadPool$Worker.run(ThreadPool.java:1604)
Caused by: java.lang.NoClassDefFoundError: com.sun.org.apache.commons.beanutils.PropertyUtils
    at ecm.DepartmentPredicate.evaluate(DepartmentPredicate.java:23)
    at org.apache.commons.collections.CollectionUtils.filter(CollectionUtils.java:405)
    at ecm.GenericSearchDB.searchDepartments(GenericSearchDB.java:1178)
    at sun.reflect.NativeMethodAccessorImpl.invoke0(Native Method)
    at sun.reflect.NativeMethodAccessorImpl.invoke(NativeMethodAccessorImpl.java:60)
    at sun.reflect.DelegatingMethodAccessorImpl.invoke(DelegatingMethodAccessorImpl.java:37)
    at java.lang.reflect.Method.invoke(Method.java:611)
    at org.apache.el.parser.AstValue.invoke(AstValue.java:159)
    at org.apache.el.MethodExpressionImpl.invoke(MethodExpressionImpl.java:276)
    at org.apache.jasper.el.JspMethodExpression.invoke(JspMethodExpression.java:67)
    at javax.faces.component.MethodBindingMethodExpressionAdapter.invoke(MethodBindingMethodExpressionAdapter.java:94)
    ... 50 more
Caused by: java.lang.ClassNotFoundException: com.sun.org.apache.commons.beanutils.PropertyUtils
    at java.net.URLClassLoader.findClass(URLClassLoader.java:434)
    at com.ibm.ws.bootstrap.ExtClassLoader.findClass(ExtClassLoader.java:191)
    at java.lang.ClassLoader.loadClass(ClassLoader.java:660)
    at com.ibm.ws.bootstrap.ExtClassLoader.loadClass(ExtClassLoader.java:111)
    at java.lang.ClassLoader.loadClass(ClassLoader.java:626)
    at com.ibm.ws.classloader.ProtectionClassLoader.loadClass(ProtectionClassLoader.java:62)
    at com.ibm.ws.classloader.ProtectionClassLoader.loadClass(ProtectionClassLoader.java:58)
    at com.ibm.ws.classloader.CompoundClassLoader.loadClass(CompoundClassLoader.java:510)
    at java.lang.ClassLoader.loadClass(ClassLoader.java:626)
    at com.ibm.ws.classloader.CompoundClassLoader.loadClass(CompoundClassLoader.java:510)
    at java.lang.ClassLoader.loadClass(ClassLoader.java:626)
    ... 61 more

Solution

As you have already noticed, your stacktrace complains about a missing class: com.sun.org.apache.commons.beanutils.PropertyUtils.

The jar in your classpath commons-beanutils-1.8.3.jar doesn't contain com.sun.org.apache.commons.beanutils.PropertyUtils, it does contain org.apache.commons.beanutils.PropertyUtils (without the com.sun at the beggining)

The jar where you can find the missing class is in this jar: jsf-impl-1.2-b19.jar

However I recommend you to have a look at your dependencies; it seems to me that you're mixing too old jars with too new ones.