$Id: readme,v 1.8.2.11 2000/12/12 21:01:41 craigmcc Exp $

                            Release Notes for:
                           ====================
                           TOMCAT Version 3.2.1
                           ====================


0.  TABLE OF CONTENTS:

    1.  Introduction
    2.  Installing and Running Tomcat
    3.  Application Development Using Tomcat
    4.  Tomcat: Past, Present, and Future
    5.  New Features In This Release
    6.  Known Bugs and Issues
    7.  Security Vulnerabilities Fixed in 3.2.1


=============================================================================
1.  INTRODUCTION

Tomcat is a servlet container and JavaServer Pages(tm) implementation.  It may
be used stand alone, or in conjunction with several popular web servers:
- Apache, version 1.3 or later
- Microsoft Internet Information Server, version 4.0 or later
- Microsoft Personal Web Server, version 4.0 or later
- Netscape Enterprise Server, version 3.0 or later

You should read the License Agreement (in the LICENSE file of the top level
directory), which applies to all software included in this release.

Tomcat Version 3.2.1 is a security related update!  See Section 7, below,
for details on the changes that have been made.  All other existing issues with
Tomcat 3.2 will remain in 3.2.1 -- they will be addressed in subsequent
maintenance updates (3.2.2, and so on).

No changes to the native code components of Tomcat 3.2 have been made.
Therefore, you should *not* need to recompile components such as mod_jserv
in order to take advantage of this release.  You only need to replace the
Java based modules in the "jakarta-tomcat-3.2.*" distribution.


=============================================================================
2.  INSTALLING AND RUNNING TOMCAT

Tomcat requires a Java Runtime Environment conformant to JRE 1.1 or later,
including any Java2 platform system.  If you wish to develop applications,
you will need a Java compiler, such as the one included in a Java Development
Kit 1.1 or later environment, including JDKs conformant with Java2.

For detailed information about installing and running Tomcat, point your
browser at file "doc/uguide/tomcat_ug.html" under the directory into which
you unpacked the Tomcat distribution.


=============================================================================
3.  APPLICATION DEVELOPMENT USING TOMCAT

Preliminary information on using Tomcat for developing Servlet/JSP based
applications is provided in the included Application Developer's Guide.
Point your browser at file "doc/appdev/index.html" under the directory into
which you unpacked the Tomcat distribution.


=============================================================================
4.  TOMCAT: PAST, PRESENT, AND FUTURE

- Version 3.0 (released 12/1999) was the initial release of Tomcat.  In 
addition to implementing the Java Servlet and Server Pages specification, 
this release featured a minimal Apache connector.

- Tomcat 3.1 (released 4/2000) improved the Apache connection and added 
connector support for Netscape and IIS web servers. It also added WAR file 
support, automatic servlet reloading, and a command line tool (jspc) to 
compile ahead of time the JSP pages that comprise your application.  Finally, 
version 3.1 also focused on reorganizing the code (modularization, cleanup, 
refactoring, removal of dead code, and separation of J2EE-specific code).

- Tomcat 3.2 is the first performance tune-up, and also adds a few new 
features (see next section).

- Tomcat 4.0 is separate development from Tomcat 3.x.  It is based on the
Catalina architecture, which is very different from the architecture of
Tomcat 3.x.  In addition, Tomcat 4.0 is to be the reference implementation
for the Servlet 2.3 and JSP 1.2 specifications.


=============================================================================
5.  NEW FEATURES IN THIS RELEASE

Tomcat 3.2.1 is a maintenance and bug fix release, based on the Tomcat 3.2
(final) code base.  The following changes are included:

- Disallowed requesting JSP pages under the WEB-INF directory
  (/WEB-INF/dummy.jsp).  Previously, only requests for static files
  were being disallowed.

- The JDBCRealm request interceptor will now log the description of any
  JDBC exception that occurs, to aid in debugging.


=============================================================================
6.  KNOWN BUGS AND ISSUES

6.1 Using An Absolute Path as Document Root Under Windows

In the TOMCAT_HOME/conf/server.xml file, you can declare a relative or absolute
directory pathname for the docRoot attribute.  If you wish to use an absolute
pathname on a Windows system, you MUST include the drive letter in order to
conform to Java's definition of an absolute path on this platform:

    GOOD:  c:\mydirectory\mydocroot
    GOOD:  c:/mydirectory/mydocroot
    BAD:   \mydirectory\mydocroot
    BAD:   /mydirectory/mydocroot

Under Unix, absolute pathnames must begin with a slash ('/') character.

6.2 Container Managed Security

Tomcat 3.2 has an implementation of container managed security,	as
described in the Servlet API Specification, version 2.2, section 11.
Please note the following information about this implementation:

- BASIC and FORM based authentication should work correctly.  Please
  report any bugs you encounter here at <http://jakarta.apache.org/bugs>.
  The example application has a protected area defined at the following URL:

	http://localhost:8080/examples/jsp/security/protected

  which can be accessed by any user defined in the configuration file
  $TOMCAT_HOME/conf/tomcat-users.xml that has been granted the
  appropriate roles.  Form-based authentication is used by default,
  but a commented out setting for Basic authentication is provided if
  you wish to give it a try.

  WARNING:  Basic authentication is not suitable for general security
  use across the Internet, or across other insecure networks, because
  usernames and passwords are sent encoded, but not encrypted, with
  every single request.

- DIGEST authentication and HTTPS client authentication (i.e. SSL)
  are not supported in this release.

6.3 Using RequestDispatcher.include() on a Welcome File [Bug Report #160]

Using the following technique results in a response with incorrect content:

- You have a subdirectory under your document root
  (for example "subdir/").

- This subdirectory contains a welcome file that you
  have configured to be displayed when that subdirectory
  is requested on a URL (for example "index.html").

- You request a RequestDispatcher for path "/subdir"
  or path "/subdir/" and then call include() on it.

The same problem can occur when you do a <jsp:include/> to a page "/subdir"
or "/subdir/" as well.

A workaround is to ask for a RequestDispatcher on the complete context-
relative path of the file you wish to have displayed, such as
"/subdir/index.html".

6.4 Automatic Servlet Reloading

Tomcat 3.2 includes a feature whereby you can ask it to automatically
reload servlet classes (loaded from either the WEB-INF/classes directory
or a JAR file in the WEB-INF/lib directory) that have been changed.  This
feature is experimental, and may not be completely functional.  In particular,
changes to classes other than the servlet you are requesting do not trigger
class reloads -- you will need to restart Tomcat to reflect changes in those
classes.

Reloading is enabled by including a reloadable="true" attribute on the
<Context> element in the "conf/server.xml" file.  Note that automatic
reload support is not recommended for production applications because of
its experimental nature, and the extra overhead required to perform the
necessary checks on every request.

6.5 Returned strings from getServletPath, getPathInfo, and getPathTranslated

The Servlet 2.2 Errata - April 27, 2000 specifies that HttpServletRequest
methods getServletPath, getPathInfo, and getPathTranslated should return
decoded strings.  This clarification has not been implemented in Tomcat 3.2.
In Tomcat 3.2, these methods return encoded strings.

6.6 Avoiding "Out of environment space" errors on Windows 95/98

This error can easily occur since the default amount of environment space is
typically insufficient to run Tomcat.  Here are a couple of ways to avoid it.

  A. If you use the MS-DOS Prompt to start Tomcat, execute Programs ->
     MS-DOS Prompt.  Right-click the MS-DOS icon on the left of the title bar
     and select Properties at the bottom of the menu.  In the MS-DOS Prompt
     Properties dialog select the Memory tab.  In the "Initial environment:"
     field, set a sufficiently high number.  If you are not sure, 3072 should
     be plenty.  Click OK and close the MS-DOS Prompt window.  Execute
     Programs -> MS-DOS Prompt again, navigate to the directory where you
     installed Tomcat.  Set the JAVA_HOME environment variable if not set
     already.  You should be able to execute "bin\startup" and "bin\shutdown"
     to start and stop Tomcat without getting an "Out of environment space"
     error.

  B. If you want to start Tomcat by double clicking a batch file such as
     startup.bat, you should right-click on the desired batch file in Windows
     Explorer and select Properties to open the MS-DOS Prompt Properties
     dialog.  Select the Memory tab and set the "Initial environment:" as
     described above.  You may want to also select the Program tab and check
     "Close on exit".  Then click OK.  A shortcut with these settings will be
     created in same directory with the same base name as the batch file.  You
     should be able to double-click the shortcut or the batch file to execute
     without getting an "Out of environment space" error.  If you wish to
     execute startup.bat and shutdown.bat in this fashion, you will need to do
     the above for both files.  In addition, you need to provide for setting
     JAVA_HOME.  This may be done by adding a "SET JAVA_HOME=path to your jdk"
     line to your autoexec.bat or to the startup.bat and shutdown.bat files
     themselves.

6.7 URL's are now case sensitive on all operating systems

As of Tomcat 3.2, URL's are case sensitive for all operating systems,
including operating systems which have case insensitive file systems, such as
Windows.  This represents a change from Tomcat 3.1, where URL's were case
insensitive on case insensitive OS's.  This was done for a number of reasons,
security and portability among them.

A "non-portable" web application, i.e. one with case mismatches, which worked
on a case insensitive OS under Tomcat 3.1 will show its non-portability when
run under Tomcat 3.2.

This can also cause URL's that look correct to actually be incorrect.  In
Windows Explorer, a directory whose name fits within the MS-DOS 8.3 format
may be displayed using a "formated" name.  For example, a directory named
"MYDIR" may display as "Mydir".  A URL like "http://localhost/mysite/Mydir/
index.jsp" would return "File Not Found" because the correct URL would be
"http://localhost/mysite/MYDIR/index.jsp".  If you find URL's being
mysteriously "not found", check for case mismatch.  Use the Windows Explorer
Properties dialog or an MS-DOS window to check the actual case of the file
and directory names.

This can cause an additional problem when Tomcat is used with a case
insensitive web server, such as IIS, where the web server serves the static
content.  The web server could serve a static page with mismatched case in the
URL. If that static page contains relative links to resources served by
Tomcat, then invoking those links would carry the mismatched case to Tomcat
where it cause the resource not to be found.

6.8 Generated Configuration Files for Web Connectors

At startup time, Tomcat normally generates configuration files like
"tomcat-apache.conf" to reflect the contexts that are defined.  However, the
generated files do NOT reflect any configuration settings found inside the
web application deployment descriptor file (web.xml) for your application.
You will need to configure any such settings that are relevant directly into
your web server's configuration files.

This is a known limitation of the design of the web connectors for Tomcat 3.2,
and will be addressed by the introduction of the MOD_WARP connector in
Tomcat 4.0.

6.9 Limitation on Form Based Login

If the pages you specify for <form-login-page> or <form-error-page> are within
the area protected by a security constraint, Tomcat 3.2 will be unable to
display them.  As a side effect of this problem, you will not be able to use
a URL pattern of "/*" to protect your entire web application when using form
based login.

A workaround is to set up your web application with the form login page and
form error page in the document root directory, place all other pages in one
or more subdirectories, and establish security constraints to protect the
subdirectories.

6.10 Limitation on Document Base Paths

Tomcat 3.2 is unable to support Windows SMB paths in a <Context> directive
like this:

        <Context path="/ctx" docBase="\\machine\share\path" />

although this approach was supported in Tomcat 3.1, and is supported in
Tomcat 4.0.  A workaround is to establish a drive mapping to "\\machine\share"
and define your context like this:

        <Context path="/ctx" docBase="r:\path" />

where "r:" is mapped to this share.

6.11 Misconfiguration Can Cause CPU-Bound Loop

If you misconfigure Tomcat 3.2 in a way that there is no valid context to
handle a request (such as removing the root context and then attempting a
request that should be handled by that context), Tomcat will enter a CPU-bound
loop instead of responding with a 404 error.

Workaround:  kill the offending Tomcat process and correct your server.xml
file such that there is a properly configured root context.


===============================================================================
7.  SECURITY VULNERABILITIES FIXED IN TOMCAT 3.2.1


7.1 Protection of Resources in /WEB-INF and /META-INF Directories

The servlet specification prohibits servlet containers from serving resources
in the /WEB-INF and /META-INF directories of a web application archive directly
to clients.  In Tomcat 3.2, this means that URLs like:

   http://localhost:8080/examples/WEB-INF/web.xml

will return an error message, rather than the contents of your deployment
descriptor.  However, there is a vulnerability in Tomcat 3.2 that exposes
this information if the client requests a URL like this instead:

    http://localhost:8080/examples//WEB-INF/web.xml

(note the double slash before "WEB-INF").  This vulnerability has been
corrected in Tomcat 3.2.1.


7.2 Show Source Vulnerability

The example application delivered with Tomcat 3.2 included a mechanism to
display the source code for the JSP page examples.  This mechanism could
be used to bypass the restrictions on displaying sensitive information in
the WEB-INF and META-INF directories.  This vulnerability has been removed.


