Question

My applicationContext.xml is in path:

src/main/resources/META-INF/spring

and property files are in path:

src/main/resources/messages

and I load spring context in web.xml as follows:

<context-param>
    <param-name>contextConfigLocation</param-name>
    <param-value>classpath:META-INF/spring/applicationContext.xml</param-value>
</context-param>

when I am configuring MessageSource and PropertyPlaceholderConfigurer as follows:

<bean id="propertyPlaceholderConfigurer"
      class="org.springframework.beans.factory.config.PropertyPlaceholderConfigurer">
    <property name="locations">
        <list>
            <value>classpath:messages/apps.properties</value>        
        </list>
    </property>
</bean>

<bean id="messageSource" class="org.springframework.context.support.ReloadableResourceBundleMessageSource">
    <property name="basenames">
        <list>
            <value>classpath:messages/ValidationMessages</value>
            <value>classpath:messages/app</value>
        </list>
    </property>
    <property name="defaultEncoding" value="UTF-8"/>
</bean>

they both don’t work, it only works when I change classpath to classpath*
Any ideas why?

Answer 1

From Spring documentation:

4.7.2.2 The classpath*: prefix

[…] location string may use the special classpath*: prefix: […]

This special prefix specifies that all classpath resources that match the given name must be obtained […], and then merged to form the final application context definition.

Are you sure there are no other messages/apps.properties files on your CLASSPATH coincidentally taking precedence and overriding your file? This description suggests that you might have several same named files that are merged when * is used.

Can you check this by calling:

SomeClass.class.getClassLoader().getResources("/messages/apps.properties");

?