Creating a Web-Application Root Directory

A Web-application directory contains the pages, Java classes and configuration data used by the application.

The following elements must appear in the directory of an application called myApp:

• The directory myApp/ - the application's root directory
• The directory myApp/WEB-INF/ - contains configuration data and Java classes used by the application
• The file myApp/WEB-INF/web.xml - the application's configuration file

Java classes used by the application, such as Servlets and external libraries, should be placed in the following locations:

• The directory myApp/WEB-INF/classes/ - Java classes (e.g. Servlets)
• The directory myApp/WEB-INF/lib/ - libraries of Java classes packed in JAR files

It is conventional to put Java source files in the directory myApp/WEB-INF/src/

The following figure illustrates the structure of the application directory: