Class 'org.springframework.web.jsf.el.SpringBeanFacesELResolver' is missing a runtime dependency

Question

I have a web application which up until yesterday was working just fine. It uses Maven, Spring, JSF, Primefaces, Eclipse (Mars), Tomcat 8 and jdk 8. Here is my pom.xml

<project xmlns="http://maven.apache.org/POM/4.0.0" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
    xsi:schemaLocation="http://maven.apache.org/POM/4.0.0 http://maven.apache.org/xsd/maven-4.0.0.xsd">
    <modelVersion>4.0.0</modelVersion>
    <groupId>PlantPlaces</groupId>
    <artifactId>PlantPlaces</artifactId>
    <version>0.0.1-SNAPSHOT</version>
    <packaging>war</packaging>

    <repositories>
        <repository>
            <id>prime-repo</id>
            <name>PrimeFaces Maven Repository</name>
            <url>http://repository.primefaces.org</url>
            <layout>default</layout>
        </repository>

        <repository>
            <id>JBoss repository</id>
            <url>http://repository.jboss.com/maven2/</url>
        </repository>
    </repositories>

    <build>
        <sourceDirectory>src</sourceDirectory>
        <plugins>
            <plugin>
                <artifactId>maven-war-plugin</artifactId>
                <version>2.6</version>
                <configuration>
                    <warSourceDirectory>WebContent</warSourceDirectory>
                    <failOnMissingWebXml>false</failOnMissingWebXml>
                </configuration>
            </plugin>
            <plugin>
                <artifactId>maven-compiler-plugin</artifactId>
                <version>3.5.1</version>
                <configuration>
                    <source>1.8</source>
                    <target>1.8</target>
                </configuration>
            </plugin>
        </plugins>
    </build>
    <dependencies>
        <dependency>
            <groupId>org.primefaces</groupId>
            <artifactId>primefaces</artifactId>
            <version>4.0</version>
        </dependency>
        <dependency>
            <groupId>org.springframework</groupId>
            <artifactId>spring-context</artifactId>
            <version>4.2.0.RELEASE</version>
        </dependency>
        <dependency>
            <groupId>org.springframework</groupId>
            <artifactId>spring-web</artifactId>
            <version>3.0.4.RELEASE</version>
        </dependency>
        <dependency>
            <groupId>javax.inject</groupId>
            <artifactId>javax.inject</artifactId>
            <version>1</version>
        </dependency>
        <dependency>
            <groupId>org.primefaces.themes</groupId>
            <artifactId>all-themes</artifactId>
            <version>1.0.10</version>
        </dependency>
        <dependency>
            <groupId>org.mockito</groupId>
            <artifactId>mockito-all</artifactId>
            <version>1.9.5</version>
        </dependency>
        <dependency>
            <groupId>junit</groupId>
            <artifactId>junit</artifactId>
            <version>4.10</version>
            <scope>test</scope>
        </dependency>
        <dependency>
            <groupId>com.sun.faces</groupId>
            <artifactId>jsf-api</artifactId>
            <version>2.2.7</version>
        </dependency>
        <dependency>
            <groupId>com.sun.faces</groupId>
            <artifactId>jsf-impl</artifactId>
            <version>2.2.7</version>
        </dependency>

        <dependency>
            <groupId>javax.servlet</groupId>
            <artifactId>javax.servlet-api</artifactId>
            <version>3.0.1</version>
        </dependency>

        <dependency>
            <groupId>javax.servlet</groupId>
            <artifactId>servlet-api</artifactId>
            <version>2.5</version>
        </dependency>

        <dependency>
            <groupId>log4j</groupId>
            <artifactId>log4j</artifactId>
            <version>1.2.17</version>
        </dependency>

        <!-- MySQL database driver -->
        <dependency>
            <groupId>mysql</groupId>
            <artifactId>mysql-connector-java</artifactId>
            <version>5.1.9</version>
        </dependency>

        <!-- https://mvnrepository.com/artifact/org.hibernate/hibernate-core -->
        <dependency>
            <groupId>org.hibernate</groupId>
            <artifactId>hibernate-core</artifactId>
            <version>4.3.10.Final</version>
        </dependency>

        <!-- EL -->
        <dependency>
            <groupId>org.glassfish.web</groupId>
            <artifactId>el-impl</artifactId>
            <version>2.2</version>
        </dependency>

    </dependencies>

</project>

I don't know why it stopped working but the full error that I keep getting is this:

Cause: Class 'org.springframework.web.jsf.el.SpringBeanFacesELResolver' is missing a runtime dependency: java.lang.NoClassDefFoundError: javax/el/ELResolver

I have tried many different pom configurations but nothing eliminates that error. Kindly assist

For starters stop mixing versions of spring and reload the dependencies. To clean the repo do `mvn dependency:purge-local-repository`. You also have multiple servlet-api versions on the class path which should also have scope provided. — M. Deinum, Aug 18 '17 at 14:27
I have followed all of your advice but the error remains the same. Thanks for pointing out the inconsistencies in my pom.xml though. I'll take a break and figure it out later — Joseph Waweru, Aug 21 '17 at 07:02
what `ide` are you using?, rebuild your project with dependencies or do a maven `install`, also have you defined your `el-resolver` in `your faces-config` file? — basamoahjnr, Aug 21 '17 at 08:00
I am using eclipse and I've already attempted the afore-mentioned steps to no avail. Here is the configuation that I have set in my faces-config file: org.springframework.web.jsf.el.SpringBeanFacesELResolver — Joseph Waweru, Aug 22 '17 at 12:44
Here is what I have tried so far. * Deleted the .m2 folder and redownloaded the maven dependencies * Uninstalled Tomcat 8.0.38 and reinstalled it (used revo uninstaller) * Did a hard git reset to commits where the application was functional * Downloaded the jars manually and put them under WEB-INF/lib The error is the same, even if I manually include the javax.el.jar in the lib folder — Joseph Waweru, Aug 24 '17 at 11:13

score 0 · Answer 1 · answered Aug 25 '17 at 08:57

I discovered that the issue was Tomcat 8 (v8.0.38). I switched to Tomcat 7 and modified my Pom.xml. I also modified my version of facelets version (from 2.2 to 2.1 in the faces-config.xml) and the deployment descriptor version from 3.1 to 2.5. Finally, I also changed the Java version from 1.8 to 1.7 - though the webapp is compiled based on java 1.6. Below is a sample of the new Pom.xml. It may still have errors since I have been trying out so many suggestions that I found online but it works:

<dependencies>

    <!-- Spring framework -->
    <dependency>
        <groupId>org.springframework</groupId>
        <artifactId>spring-core</artifactId>
        <version>3.1.2.RELEASE</version>
    </dependency>

    <dependency>
        <groupId>org.springframework</groupId>
        <artifactId>spring-web</artifactId>
        <version>3.1.2.RELEASE</version>
    </dependency>

    <!-- JSR-330 -->
    <dependency>
        <groupId>javax.inject</groupId>
        <artifactId>javax.inject</artifactId>
        <version>1</version>
    </dependency>

    <!-- JSF -->
    <dependency>
        <groupId>com.sun.faces</groupId>
        <artifactId>jsf-api</artifactId>
        <version>2.1.13</version>
    </dependency>
    <dependency>
        <groupId>com.sun.faces</groupId>
        <artifactId>jsf-impl</artifactId>
        <version>2.1.13</version>
    </dependency>

    <dependency>
        <groupId>javax.servlet</groupId>
        <artifactId>jstl</artifactId>
        <version>1.2</version>
    </dependency>

    <dependency>
        <groupId>javax.servlet</groupId>
        <artifactId>servlet-api</artifactId>
        <version>2.5</version>
    </dependency>

    <dependency>
        <groupId>javax.servlet.jsp</groupId>
        <artifactId>jsp-api</artifactId>
        <version>2.1</version>
    </dependency>

    <!-- EL -->
    <dependency>
        <groupId>org.glassfish.web</groupId>
        <artifactId>el-impl</artifactId>
        <version>2.2</version>
    </dependency>

    <!-- Tomcat 6 need this -->
    <dependency>
        <groupId>com.sun.el</groupId>
        <artifactId>el-ri</artifactId>
        <version>1.0</version>
    </dependency>

    <dependency>
        <groupId>org.primefaces</groupId>
        <artifactId>primefaces</artifactId>
        <version>4.0</version>
    </dependency>

    <dependency>
        <groupId>org.primefaces.themes</groupId>
        <artifactId>all-themes</artifactId>
        <version>1.0.10</version>
    </dependency>

    <!-- MySQL database driver -->
    <dependency>
        <groupId>mysql</groupId>
        <artifactId>mysql-connector-java</artifactId>
        <version>5.1.9</version>
    </dependency>

    <!-- https://mvnrepository.com/artifact/org.hibernate/hibernate-core -->
    <dependency>
        <groupId>org.hibernate</groupId>
        <artifactId>hibernate-core</artifactId>
        <version>4.3.10.Final</version>
    </dependency>

    <!-- Logging -->
    <dependency>
        <groupId>log4j</groupId>
        <artifactId>log4j</artifactId>
        <version>1.2.17</version>
    </dependency>

    <!-- https://mvnrepository.com/artifact/com.rabbitmq/amqp-client -->
    <dependency>
        <groupId>com.rabbitmq</groupId>
        <artifactId>amqp-client</artifactId>
        <version>3.6.6</version>
    </dependency>

    <!-- https://mvnrepository.com/artifact/commons-io/commons-io -->
    <dependency>
        <groupId>commons-io</groupId>
        <artifactId>commons-io</artifactId>
        <version>2.5</version>
    </dependency>

    <!-- https://mvnrepository.com/artifact/commons-cli/commons-cli -->
    <dependency>
        <groupId>commons-cli</groupId>
        <artifactId>commons-cli</artifactId>
        <version>1.2</version>
    </dependency>

    <!-- https://mvnrepository.com/artifact/net.coobird/thumbnailator -->
    <dependency>
        <groupId>net.coobird</groupId>
        <artifactId>thumbnailator</artifactId>
        <version>0.4.8</version>
    </dependency>

</dependencies>

<build>
    <finalName>plantplaces</finalName>

    <plugins>
        <plugin>
            <groupId>org.apache.maven.plugins</groupId>
            <artifactId>maven-compiler-plugin</artifactId>
            <version>2.3.1</version>
            <configuration>
                <source>1.6</source>
                <target>1.6</target>
            </configuration>
        </plugin>
    </plugins>
</build>

Hi. I followed the information provided in this guide: https://stackoverflow.com/tags/jsf/info It worked for Tomcat 7 but when I tried it on the original project that used Tomcat 8, it didn't work. Thanks for continuing to guide me — Joseph Waweru, Aug 28 '17 at 07:22

Class 'org.springframework.web.jsf.el.SpringBeanFacesELResolver' is missing a runtime dependency

1 Answers1