geode-docs/configuring/running/deploying_config_jar_files.html.md.erb

---
title:  Deploying Configuration Files in JAR Files
---

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This section provides a procedure and an example for deploying configuration files in JAR files.

**Procedure**

1.  Jar the files.
2.  Set the <%=vars.product_name_long%> system properties to point to the files as they reside in the jar file.
3.  Include the jar file in your `CLASSPATH.`
4.  Verify the jar file copies are the only ones visible to the application at runtime. <%=vars.product_name%> searches the `CLASSPATH` after searching other locations, so the files cannot be available in the other search areas.
5.  Start your application. The configuration file is loaded from the jar file.

**Example of Deploying a Configuration JAR**

The following example deploys the cache configuration file, `myCache.xml`, in `my.jar`. The following displays the contents of `my.jar`:

``` pre
% jar -tf my.jar 
META-INF 
META-INF/MANIFEST.MF 
myConfig/ 
myConfig/myCache.xml
```

In this example, you would perform the following steps to deploy the configuration jar file:

1.  Set the system property `gemfire.cache-xml-file` to `myConfig/myCache.xml`.
2.  Set your `CLASSPATH` to include `my.jar`.
3.  Verify there is no file already  in the filesystem named `./myConfig/myCache.xml`, so <%=vars.product_name%> will be forced to search the jar file to find it.

When you start your application, the configuration file is loaded from the jar file.