Spring MVC and JUnit: Failed to load ApplicationContext

Question

In order to test my DAO and automatically autowire my objects, I created the following test class in JUnit:

@RunWith( SpringJUnit4ClassRunner.class )
@ContextConfiguration(locations={"/spring-servlet.xml"})
public class MyTest {

    // Other stuff here
}

After running it, I get the following error:

java.lang.IllegalStateException: Failed to load ApplicationContext
    at org.springframework.test.context.CacheAwareContextLoaderDelegate.loadContext(CacheAwareContextLoaderDelegate.java:99)
    at org.springframework.test.context.TestContext.getApplicationContext(TestContext.java:122)
    at org.springframework.test.context.web.ServletTestExecutionListener.setUpRequestContextIfNecessary(ServletTestExecutionListener.java:105)
    at org.springframework.test.context.web.ServletTestExecutionListener.prepareTestInstance(ServletTestExecutionListener.java:74)
    at org.springframework.test.context.TestContextManager.prepareTestInstance(TestContextManager.java:312)
    at org.springframework.test.context.junit4.SpringJUnit4ClassRunner.createTest(SpringJUnit4ClassRunner.java:211)
    at org.springframework.test.context.junit4.SpringJUnit4ClassRunner$1.runReflectiveCall(SpringJUnit4ClassRunner.java:288)
    at org.junit.internal.runners.model.ReflectiveCallable.run(ReflectiveCallable.java:12)
    at org.springframework.test.context.junit4.SpringJUnit4ClassRunner.methodBlock(SpringJUnit4ClassRunner.java:284)
    at org.springframework.test.context.junit4.SpringJUnit4ClassRunner.runChild(SpringJUnit4ClassRunner.java:231)
    at org.springframework.test.context.junit4.SpringJUnit4ClassRunner.runChild(SpringJUnit4ClassRunner.java:88)
    at org.junit.runners.ParentRunner$3.run(ParentRunner.java:238)
    at org.junit.runners.ParentRunner$1.schedule(ParentRunner.java:63)
    at org.junit.runners.ParentRunner.runChildren(ParentRunner.java:236)
    at org.junit.runners.ParentRunner.access$000(ParentRunner.java:53)
    at org.junit.runners.ParentRunner$2.evaluate(ParentRunner.java:229)
    at org.springframework.test.context.junit4.statements.RunBeforeTestClassCallbacks.evaluate(RunBeforeTestClassCallbacks.java:61)
    at org.springframework.test.context.junit4.statements.RunAfterTestClassCallbacks.evaluate(RunAfterTestClassCallbacks.java:71)
    at org.junit.runners.ParentRunner.run(ParentRunner.java:309)
    at org.springframework.test.context.junit4.SpringJUnit4ClassRunner.run(SpringJUnit4ClassRunner.java:174)
    at org.eclipse.jdt.internal.junit4.runner.JUnit4TestReference.run(JUnit4TestReference.java:50)
    at org.eclipse.jdt.internal.junit.runner.TestExecution.run(TestExecution.java:38)
    at org.eclipse.jdt.internal.junit.runner.RemoteTestRunner.runTests(RemoteTestRunner.java:467)
    at org.eclipse.jdt.internal.junit.runner.RemoteTestRunner.runTests(RemoteTestRunner.java:683)
    at org.eclipse.jdt.internal.junit.runner.RemoteTestRunner.run(RemoteTestRunner.java:390)
    at org.eclipse.jdt.internal.junit.runner.RemoteTestRunner.main(RemoteTestRunner.java:197)
Caused by: org.springframework.beans.factory.BeanDefinitionStoreException: IOException parsing XML document from class path resource [spring-servlet.xml]; nested exception is java.io.FileNotFoundException: class path resource [spring-servlet.xml] cannot be opened because it does not exist
    at org.springframework.beans.factory.xml.XmlBeanDefinitionReader.loadBeanDefinitions(XmlBeanDefinitionReader.java:341)
    at org.springframework.beans.factory.xml.XmlBeanDefinitionReader.loadBeanDefinitions(XmlBeanDefinitionReader.java:302)
    at org.springframework.beans.factory.support.AbstractBeanDefinitionReader.loadBeanDefinitions(AbstractBeanDefinitionReader.java:174)
    at org.springframework.beans.factory.support.AbstractBeanDefinitionReader.loadBeanDefinitions(AbstractBeanDefinitionReader.java:209)
    at org.springframework.beans.factory.support.AbstractBeanDefinitionReader.loadBeanDefinitions(AbstractBeanDefinitionReader.java:180)
    at org.springframework.beans.factory.support.AbstractBeanDefinitionReader.loadBeanDefinitions(AbstractBeanDefinitionReader.java:243)
    at org.springframework.test.context.support.AbstractGenericContextLoader.loadBeanDefinitions(AbstractGenericContextLoader.java:233)
    at org.springframework.test.context.support.AbstractGenericContextLoader.loadContext(AbstractGenericContextLoader.java:117)
    at org.springframework.test.context.support.AbstractGenericContextLoader.loadContext(AbstractGenericContextLoader.java:60)
    at org.springframework.test.context.support.AbstractDelegatingSmartContextLoader.delegateLoading(AbstractDelegatingSmartContextLoader.java:100)
    at org.springframework.test.context.support.AbstractDelegatingSmartContextLoader.loadContext(AbstractDelegatingSmartContextLoader.java:248)
    at org.springframework.test.context.CacheAwareContextLoaderDelegate.loadContextInternal(CacheAwareContextLoaderDelegate.java:64)
    at org.springframework.test.context.CacheAwareContextLoaderDelegate.loadContext(CacheAwareContextLoaderDelegate.java:91)
    ... 25 more
Caused by: java.io.FileNotFoundException: class path resource [spring-servlet.xml] cannot be opened because it does not exist
    at org.springframework.core.io.ClassPathResource.getInputStream(ClassPathResource.java:157)
    at org.springframework.beans.factory.xml.XmlBeanDefinitionReader.loadBeanDefinitions(XmlBeanDefinitionReader.java:328)
    ... 37 more

My Dao is under:

 MyProject\src\main\java\org\baudo\dao

My test is under:

 MyProject\src\test\java\org\baudo\dao

My spring-servlet.xml is under:

 MyProject\src\main\webapp\WEB-INF      

I tried to pass to @ContextConfiguration many different paths and I placed my spring-servlet.xml in every possible path of the application. This cause me to think it's not a path problem and I think there is something else going on.

This is how I configured the object I want to autowire in Spring:

<bean id="sessionFactory"
class="org.springframework.orm.hibernate3.LocalSessionFactoryBean">
<property name="dataSource" ref="dataSource" />
<property name="configLocation">
    <value>classpath:hibernate.cfg.xml</value>
</property>
<property name="configurationClass">
    <value>org.hibernate.cfg.AnnotationConfiguration</value>
</property>
<property name="hibernateProperties">
    <props>
        <prop key="hibernate.dialect">${jdbc.dialect}</prop>
        <prop key="hibernate.show_sql">true</prop>
    </props>
</property>
</bean>

It's correctly autowired when I run the application, but not during the tests. That's the reason I added @ContextConfiguration.

I also have that line in my spring configuration:

<tx:annotation-driven />

This are de dependencies I added for tests into the pom.xml

<dependency>
    <groupId>junit</groupId>
    <artifactId>junit</artifactId>
    <version>4.11</version>
</dependency>            
<dependency>
   <groupId>org.springframework</groupId>
   <artifactId>spring-test</artifactId>
   <version>3.2.3.RELEASE</version>
</dependency>

Oher info: this is a web app with Spring MVC and Hibernate. I run unit tests by right-clicking the test file and selecting "run as"->"JUnit test"

But I noticed Eclipse doesn't care of this particular JUnit, because it uses its own from the Java Development Tools plugin. However it's JUnit 4.

What's wrong? How can I enable autowiring for unit testings too?

Solution

As the stack trace indicates, the Spring runner looks for the XML file in the claspath. So assuming a standard Maven layout, and since this XML file is used by tests, it should be under src/test/resources.

It seems like you want to use the same file for your application and your tests. This is a strange choice, since DAO tests shouldn't use the same beans (controllers, etc.) as the real MVC application.

Comments

[user1883212]

I did and now I've a different message like this:Caused by: java.io.FileNotFoundException: class path resource [WEB-INF/jdbc.properties] cannot be opened because it does not exist

[user1883212]

It sounds like the errors now disappeared but autowiring is still rking and this cause a null pointer exception

[JB Nizet]

Edit your question and show the stack trace of the exception and the relevant code, or ask another question.

[sreeprasad]

Is your src/tst/resources in the build path ? Add that directory to the build path and put your jdbc.properties there. Please provide a full stack trace