The instructions in this chapter specifically address deploying a BIRT report to Apache Tomcat version 7.0. Although the information in this chapter is specific to this version of Tomcat, a BIRT report can also be deployed to other versions of Tomcat and to other application servers.

There are only minor differences between the requirements for deploying to Tomcat version 7.0 and deploying to other versions of Apache Tomcat. Apache Tomcat 7.0 runs Java 6 or later by default, which is also the recommended Java level for BIRT 4.3.1

Most application servers require a web archive (WAR) file that contains everything application requires, including a web.xml file describing the application and various deployment preferences. BIRT Report Engine includes a WAR file appropriate to Tomcat. Typically, the WAR file requires no modification. In some cases, developers who have experience with other application servers can modify the web.xml file to reflect the requirements of their environments. The section on mapping the report viewer folders, later in this chapter, discusses setting the web.xml parameters.

Deployment to JBoss may require copying axis.jar and axis-ant.jar from WEB‑INF/lib to the following directory:

This step is not necessary for all versions of JBoss, but if there are difficulties with a JBoss deployment, copying these files can resolve the problem.