Whenever I try to post to an https endpoint, I get a javax.net.ssl.SSLException: java.lang.NullPointerException :
import org.apache.commons.httpclient.MultiThreadedHttpConnectionManager;
import org.apache.commons.httpclient.methods.GetMethod;
import org.apache.commons.httpclient.HttpClient;
try {
MultiThreadedHttpConnectionManager connectionManager = new MultiThreadedHttpConnectionManager();
HttpClient httpClient = new HttpClient(connectionManager);
PostMethod pm = new PostMethod("https://www.random.org");
httpClient.executeMethod(pm);
} catch (Exception e) {
e.printStackTrace();
}
Which gives me:
javax.net.ssl.SSLException: java.lang.NullPointerException
at com.sun.net.ssl.internal.ssl.Alerts.getSSLException(Alerts.java:190)
at com.sun.net.ssl.internal.ssl.SSLSocketImpl.fatal(SSLSocketImpl.java:1731)
at com.sun.net.ssl.internal.ssl.SSLSocketImpl.fatal(SSLSocketImpl.java:1692)
at com.sun.net.ssl.internal.ssl.SSLSocketImpl.handleException(SSLSocketImpl.java:1675)
at com.sun.net.ssl.internal.ssl.SSLSocketImpl.handleException(SSLSocketImpl.java:1601)
at com.sun.net.ssl.internal.ssl.AppOutputStream.write(AppOutputStream.java:94)
at java.io.BufferedOutputStream.flushBuffer(BufferedOutputStream.java:65)
at java.io.BufferedOutputStream.flush(BufferedOutputStream.java:123)
at org.apache.commons.httpclient.HttpConnection.flushRequestOutputStream(HttpConnection.java:828)
at org.apache.commons.httpclient.MultiThreadedHttpConnectionManager$HttpConnectionAdapter.flushRequestOutputStream(MultiThreadedHttpConnectionManager.java:1565)
at org.apache.commons.httpclient.HttpMethodBase.writeRequest(HttpMethodBase.java:2116)
at org.apache.commons.httpclient.HttpMethodBase.execute(HttpMethodBase.java:1096)
at org.apache.commons.httpclient.HttpMethodDirector.executeWithRetry(HttpMethodDirector.java:398)
at org.apache.commons.httpclient.HttpMethodDirector.executeMethod(HttpMethodDirector.java:171)
at org.apache.commons.httpclient.HttpClient.executeMethod(HttpClient.java:397)
at org.apache.commons.httpclient.HttpClient.executeMethod(HttpClient.java:323)
at <My File>
Caused by: java.lang.NullPointerException
at org.bouncycastle.jce.provider.JCEECPublicKey.<init>(Unknown Source)
at org.bouncycastle.jce.provider.JDKKeyFactory.createPublicKeyFromPublicKeyInfo(Unknown Source)
at org.bouncycastle.jce.provider.X509CertificateObject.getPublicKey(Unknown Source)
at sun.security.validator.PKIXValidator.initCommon(PKIXValidator.java:92)
at sun.security.validator.PKIXValidator.<init>(PKIXValidator.java:60)
at sun.security.validator.Validator.getInstance(Validator.java:161)
at com.sun.net.ssl.internal.ssl.X509TrustManagerImpl.getValidator(X509TrustManagerImpl.java:108)
at com.sun.net.ssl.internal.ssl.X509TrustManagerImpl.checkServerTrusted(X509TrustManagerImpl.java:204)
at com.sun.net.ssl.internal.ssl.X509TrustManagerImpl.checkServerTrusted(X509TrustManagerImpl.java:249)
at com.sun.net.ssl.internal.ssl.ClientHandshaker.serverCertificate(ClientHandshaker.java:1185)
at com.sun.net.ssl.internal.ssl.ClientHandshaker.processMessage(ClientHandshaker.java:136)
at com.sun.net.ssl.internal.ssl.Handshaker.processLoop(Handshaker.java:593)
at com.sun.net.ssl.internal.ssl.Handshaker.process_record(Handshaker.java:529)
at com.sun.net.ssl.internal.ssl.SSLSocketImpl.readRecord(SSLSocketImpl.java:925)
at com.sun.net.ssl.internal.ssl.SSLSocketImpl.performInitialHandshake(SSLSocketImpl.java:1170)
at com.sun.net.ssl.internal.ssl.SSLSocketImpl.writeRecord(SSLSocketImpl.java:637)
at com.sun.net.ssl.internal.ssl.AppOutputStream.write(AppOutputStream.java:89)
I haven’t done anything specifically to configure SSL on my machine, but the JSSE test scripts I’ve run seem to indicate that it’s installed. Have I maybe skipped a necessary step? The NullPointerException makes me think that this might be a bug, rather than an expected error.
EDIT 15 May 2012:
I’ve drilled down a bit using the eclipse debugger, to the point where I can see the certs in my SSLSocketFactoryImpl.
SchemeSocketFactory socketfac = httpClient.getConnectionManager().getSchemeRegistry().getScheme("https").getSchemeSocketFactory();
socketfac.socketfactory.context.trustManager.trustedCerts.map.table, in debugger.
I can FIND the cert for the site that I’m trying to hit; the thing is, along the way, there’s a null pointer exception in the table. (See attached images.) If I use the debugger to remove the 2 (of 183) entries in my entry set which produce an NPE, my code runs perfectly well, but this doesn’t seem like a workable solution. I don’t think it’s an issue with my keystore itself – if I use keytool -list -keystore cacerts, It outputs 183 entries, and each of them seems to be formatted appropriately.
Finally managed to tease out an answer. I was including bouncycastle version 133 using Maven as part of another artifact required by a separate part of the project. My solution was to upgrade bouncycastle’s versionId to 140 in my maven pom.xml file.