Question

I need my webapp to use the class files in the jar I produced instead of the directory /classes.
If I add my jar to the lib directory, will my application run without having to add a mapping to my web.xml ?

Answer 1

Source code is for humans, not for webapps. You need to compile the classes, package them into a jar file and place it inside WEB-INF/lib.

Edit:

If you put the jar file inside the WEB-INF/lib directory, the webapp will pick it up automatically. No need to add anything to the web.xml.