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<html lang="en"><head><META http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8"><link href="./images/docs-stylesheet.css" rel="stylesheet" type="text/css"><title>Apache Tomcat 9 (9.0.112) - Virtual Hosting and Tomcat
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</h1><div class="versionInfo">
Version 9.0.112,
<time datetime="2025-11-06">Nov 6 2025
</time></div><div style="height: 1px;"></div><div style="clear: left;"></div></div></div></div></header><div id="middle"><div><div id="mainLeft" class="noprint"><div><nav><div><h2>Links
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</h2><h3 id="Table_of_Contents">Table of Contents
</h3><div class="text">
<ul><li><a href="#Assumptions">Assumptions
</a></li><li><a href="#server.xml">server.xml
</a></li><li><a href="#Webapps_Directory">Webapps Directory
</a></li><li><a href="#Configuring_Your_Contexts">Configuring Your Contexts
</a><ol><li><a href="#General">General
</a></li><li><a href="#context.xml_-_approach__1">context.xml - approach #1
</a></li><li><a href="#context.xml_-_approach__2">context.xml - approach #2
</a></li><li><a href="#Defaults_per_host">Defaults per host
</a></li><li><a href="#Further_Information">Further Information
</a></li></ol></li></ul>
</div><h3 id="Assumptions">Assumptions
</h3><div class="text">
<p>
For the sake of this how-to, assume you have a development host with two
host names,
<code>ren
</code> and
<code>stimpy
</code>. Let's also assume
one instance of Tomcat running, so
<code>$CATALINA_HOME
</code> refers to
wherever it's installed, perhaps
<code>/usr/local/tomcat
</code>.
</p>
<p>
Also, this how-to uses Unix-style path separators and commands; if you're
on Windows modify accordingly.
</p>
</div><h3 id="server.xml">server.xml
</h3><div class="text">
<p>
At the simplest, edit the
<a href="config/engine.html">Engine
</a> portion
of your
<code>server.xml
</code> file to look like this:
</p>
<div class="codeBox"><pre><code><Engine name="Catalina" defaultHost="ren"
>
<Host name="ren" appBase="renapps"/
>
<Host name="stimpy" appBase="stimpyapps"/
>
</Engine
></code></pre></div>
<p>
Note that the directory structures under the appBase for each host should
not overlap each other.
</p>
<p>
Consult the configuration documentation for other attributes of the
<a href="config/engine.html">Engine
</a> and
<a href="config/host.html">
Host
</a> elements.
</p>
</div><h3 id="Webapps_Directory">Webapps Directory
</h3><div class="text">
<p>
Create directories for each of the virtual hosts:
</p>
<div class="codeBox"><pre><code>mkdir $CATALINA_HOME/renapps
mkdir $CATALINA_HOME/stimpyapps
</code></pre></div>
</div><h3 id="Configuring_Your_Contexts">Configuring Your Contexts
</h3><div class="text">
<div class="subsection"><h4 id="General">General
</h4><div class="text">
<p>Contexts are normally located underneath the appBase directory. For
example, to deploy the
<code>foobar
</code> context as a war file in
the
<code>ren
</code> host, use
<code>$CATALINA_HOME/renapps/foobar.war
</code>. Note that the
default or ROOT context for
<code>ren
</code> would be deployed as
<code>$CATALINA_HOME/renapps/ROOT.war
</code> (WAR) or
<code>$CATALINA_HOME/renapps/ROOT
</code> (directory).
</p>
<p><strong>NOTE: The
<code>docBase
</code> for a context should never be
the same as the
<code>appBase
</code> for a host.
</strong>
</p>
</div></div>
<div class="subsection"><h4 id="context.xml_-_approach__1">context.xml - approach #1
</h4><div class="text">
<p>
Within your Context, create a
<code>META-INF
</code> directory and then
place your Context definition in it in a file named
<code>context.xml
</code>. i.e.
<code>$CATALINA_HOME/renapps/ROOT/META-INF/context.xml
</code>
This makes deployment easier, particularly if you're distributing a WAR
file.
</p>
</div></div>
<div class="subsection"><h4 id="context.xml_-_approach__2">context.xml - approach #2
</h4><div class="text">
<p>
Create a structure under
<code>$CATALINA_HOME/conf/Catalina
</code>
corresponding to your virtual hosts, e.g.:
</p>
<div class="codeBox"><pre><code>mkdir $CATALINA_HOME/conf/Catalina/ren
mkdir $CATALINA_HOME/conf/Catalina/stimpy
</code></pre></div>
<p>
Note that the ending directory name "Catalina" represents the
<code>name
</code> attribute of the
<a href="config/engine.html">Engine
</a> element as shown above.
</p>
<p>
Now, for your default webapps, add:
</p>
<div class="codeBox"><pre><code>$CATALINA_HOME/conf/Catalina/ren/ROOT.xml
$CATALINA_HOME/conf/Catalina/stimpy/ROOT.xml
</code></pre></div>
<p>
If you want to use the Tomcat manager webapp for each host, you'll also
need to add it here:
</p>
<div class="codeBox"><pre><code>cd $CATALINA_HOME/conf/Catalina
cp localhost/manager.xml ren/
cp localhost/manager.xml stimpy/
</code></pre></div>
</div></div>
<div class="subsection"><h4 id="Defaults_per_host">Defaults per host
</h4><div class="text">
<p>
You can override the default values found in
<code>conf/context.xml
</code>
and
<code>conf/web.xml
</code> by specifying the new values in files
named
<code>context.xml.default
</code> and
<code>web.xml.default
</code>
from the host specific xml directory.
</p>
<p>Following our previous example, you could use
<code>$CATALINA_HOME/conf/Catalina/ren/web.xml.default
</code>
to customize the defaults for all webapps that are deployed in the virtual
host named
<code>ren
</code>.
</p>
</div></div>
<div class="subsection"><h4 id="Further_Information">Further Information
</h4><div class="text">
<p>
Consult the configuration documentation for other attributes of the
<a href="config/context.html">Context
</a> element.
</p>
</div></div>
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