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<document url="index.html">
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<properties>
<author email="craigmcc@apache.org">Craig R. McClanahan</author>
<title>Overview</title>
</properties>
<body>
<section name="Overview">
<p>This manual contains reference information about all of the configuration
directives that can be included in a <code>conf/server.xml</code> file to
configure the behavior of the Tomcat 6 Servlet/JSP container. It does not
attempt to describe which configuration directives should be used to perform
specific tasks - for that, see the various <em>HOW-TO</em> documents on the
main index page.</p>
<p>Tomcat configuration files are formatted as schemaless XML; elements and
attributes are case-sensitive. Apache Ant-style variable substitution
is supported; a system property with the name <code>propname</code> may be
used in a configuration file using the syntax <code>${propname}</code>. All
system properties are available including those set using the <code>-D</code>
syntax, those automatically made available by the JVM and those configured in
the <code>$CATALINA_BASE/conf/catalina.properties</code> file.
</p>
<p>The configuration element descriptions are organized into the following
major categories:</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Top Level Elements</strong> - <code><Server></code> is the
root element of the entire configuration file, while
<code><Service></code> represents a group of Connectors that is
associated with an Engine.</li>
<li><strong>Connectors</strong> - Represent the interface between external
clients sending requests to (and receiving responses from) a particular
Service.</li>
<li><strong>Containers</strong> - Represent components whose function is to
process incoming requests, and create the corresponding responses.
An Engine handles all requests for a Service, a Host handles all requests
for a particular virtual host, and a Context handles all requests for a
specific web application.</li>
<li><strong>Nested Components</strong> - Represent elements that can be
nested inside the element for a Container. Some elements can be nested
inside any Container, while others can only be nested inside a
Context.</li>
</ul>
<p>For each element, the corresponding documentation follows this general
outline:</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Introduction</strong> - Overall description of this particular
component. There will be a corresponding Java <em>interface</em> (in
the <code>org.apache.catalina</code> package) that is implemented by one
or more standard implementations.</li>
<li><strong>Attributes</strong> - The set of attributes that are legal for
this element. Generally, this will be subdivided into <em>Common</em>
attributes that are supported by all implementations of the corresponding
Java interface, and <em>Standard Implementation</em> attributes that are
specific to a particular Java class that implements this interface.
The names of required attributes are <strong>bolded</strong>.</li>
<li><strong>Nested Components</strong> - Enumerates which of the <em>Nested
Components</em> can be legally nested within this element.</li>
<li><strong>Special Features</strong> - Describes the configuration of a large
variety of special features (specific to each element type) that are
supported by the standard implementation of this interface.</li>
</ul>
</section>
</body>
</document>