From a Struts developer point of view, the one required configuration file used by the framework is web.xml.
From here, you have full control over how Struts configures both itself and your application. By default, Struts will load a set of internal configuration files to configure itself, then another set to configure your application, however it is possible to build an entire Struts application without writing a single configuration file other than web.xml.
The table lists the files that you can use to configure the framework for your application. Some configuration files can be reloaded dynamically. Dynamic reloading makes interactive development possible. See Reloading configuration for more.
| File | Optional | Location (relative to webapp) | Purpose |
|---|---|---|---|
| web.xml | no | /WEB-INF/ | Web deployment descriptor to include all necessary framework components |
| struts.xml | yes | /WEB-INF/classes/ | Main configuration, contains result/view types, action mappings, interceptors, and so forth |
| default.properties | yes | /WEB-INF/classes/ | Framework properties |
| struts-default.xml | yes | /WEB-INF/lib/struts2-core.jar | Default configuration provided by Struts |
| struts-default.vm | yes | /WEB-INF/classes/ | Default macros referenced by velocity.properties |
| struts-plugin.xml | yes | At the root of a plugin JAR | Optional configuration files for Plugins in the same format as struts.xml. |
| struts-deferred.xml | yes | At the root of a plugin JAR | Optional configuration files for Plugins, most useful for defining extension points |
| velocity.properties | yes | /WEB-INF/classes/ | Override the default Velocity configuration |
Common static content that is needed by the framework (JavaScript and CSS files, etc.) is served automatically by the FilterDispatcher filter. Any request starting with /struts/ denotes that static content is required, and then mapping the value after /struts/ to common packages in the framework and, optionally in the application's class path.
By default, the following packages are searched:
org.apache.struts2.statictemplateAdditional packages can be specified by providing a comma separated list to the configuration parameter named “packages” (configured in web.xml for the FilterDispatcher filter). When specifying additional static content, you should be careful not to expose sensitive configuration information (such as the password to a database).