DO NOT REPLY [Bug 4462] New: - Websphere causes ALL forwards with redirect=true to break

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http://nagoya.apache.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=4462

Websphere causes ALL forwards with redirect=true to break

           Summary: Websphere causes ALL forwards with redirect=true to
                    break
           Product: Struts
           Version: 1.0 Final
          Platform: Other
               URL: http://www-
                    1.ibm.com/servlet/support/manager?rs=180&rt=0&org=SW&doc
                    =1005783
        OS/Version: All
            Status: NEW
          Severity: Major
          Priority: Other
         Component: Controller
        AssignedTo: struts-dev@jakarta.apache.org
        ReportedBy: joe.khoobyar@wftech.com


Unfortunately, in IBM WebSphere the lines:

    path = request.getContextPath() + path;
    response.sendRedirect( response.encodeRedirectURL( path ) );

in the ActionServlet does not work.  The cause of this, ruling out the lineage 
and possible severe brain damage of IBM developers, is that IBM prepends the 
current web app's path to the redirect URL when the URL begins with "/".  In 
fact, IBM thinks that this is a feature.  

Though this is not really a bug in struts it becomes impossible to work around 
without modifying the ActionServlet.  This is hardly a viable option for us, 
because our client has a large IT department riddled with bureacracy and is 
quite afraid of the ramnifications of modifying existing software packages.

Please respond to this as soon as you can, because this is an important issue 
for our company.  The organization we are developing for is considering the use 
of struts in its future internal and external java projects, which would 
probably be numerous.  We are using IBM WebSphere 3.5.3.

If you need to contact me over the weekend, an alternate e-mail is 
joe@ankhcraft.com .

Thanks,
Joe Khoobyar

---- Quote from IBM's site below ----
1. Prior to 3.022, developers had to put the full web path for their resource 
in the sendRedirect call. In 3.022 and later, WebSphere correctly prepends the 
current web app path to the given uri. This means that 

sendRedirect("/myapp/mypage.jsp") 

will resolve to " http://myhost/myapp/myapp/mypage.jsp " (if the current web 
path is "myapp") and (probably) generate a page-not-found error. 


The workaround is to change application code to remove the app path from the 
uri, or to add a new web app path (in this example "/myapp/myapp") to the web 
application to "fake out" WebSphere into serving the uri.