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Asked: 2026-06-14T14:12:35+00:00

Consider a default webapp configuration in Maven (for the test case I used struts2-blank-archetype

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Consider a default webapp configuration in Maven (for the test case I used struts2-blank-archetype from https://repository.apache.org/content/groups/public/archetype-catalog.xml ).

This archetype comes with maven jetty plugin’s version 6. With the configuration below, if I change a jsp under /src/main/webapp/WEB-INF/ and save it, refreshing the browser will show these changes.

        <plugin>
            <groupId>org.mortbay.jetty</groupId>
            <artifactId>maven-jetty-plugin</artifactId>
            <version>6.1.21</version>
            <configuration>
                <scanIntervalSeconds>10</scanIntervalSeconds>
            </configuration>
        </plugin>

(notice that one doesn’t even need to put the scantarget element, as we don’t want a complete container reload when you just change a jsp).

However, the exact same configuration of version 8 of the plugin (see below) does not work. If I change the same jsp, refreshing the browser will show the old JSP contents. Only by stopping and starting the server will I see the changes.

        <plugin>
            <groupId>org.mortbay.jetty</groupId>
             <artifactId>jetty-maven-plugin</artifactId>
             <version>8.1.7.v20120910</version>
            <configuration>
                <scanIntervalSeconds>10</scanIntervalSeconds>
            </configuration>
        </plugin>

What is wrong with this configuration, and what configuration would produce the same results in version 8 (ie, auto-refreshing the jsp contents without restarting the server)?

EDIT:
Here’s a 2 minute test you can try:

  1. Create archetype struts2-archetype-convention (“mvn archetype:generate”, 308, package war).
  2. Edit the pom and set the jetty plugin configuration to the one listed above (version 6)
  3. mvn jetty:run
  4. Open the browser on “http://localhost:8080&#8221;
  5. See “Languages” on the page
  6. Edit /src/main/webapp/WEB-INF/content/hello.jsp – change “Languages” for something else. Save.
  7. Refresh the browser and see the change.
  8. Repeat the steps. On step 2, change the artifactId and version to the ones listed above (version 8)
  9. Confirm the webpage does not change upon refresh after you perform the change in the JSP.
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1 Answer

  1. Editorial Team

    After the previous comments I was able to identify the root cause of this issue. While this is a bit specific to our use case, I share this with the community nonetheless.

    This is basically caused by the timestamps of the files. My work directory is an NFS mount of another server. For some strange reason* the clock on that server is delayed. This means that if it’s 9:00 and I change the JSP file, the file will be timestamped with 8:40.

    There might have been a change in Jetty from 6 to 8 regarding the strategy used for JSP file reloading – while Jetty 6 does not seem to care about the file’s timestamp and refreshes anyway, Jetty 8 is more sensitive and does not reload the file.

    So the “solution” here was simply to update the remote NFS server’s clock.

    *meaning the NTP deamon is running, I can ping the ntp servers, other machines on the same networks have the same NTP settings and yet this machine is still having its clock drift

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