Struts 2 Annotation With Interceptors not Working

Question

I have been trying to implement Interceptors in my application each and everything works fine till the time I don't include interceptor Annotation in my action. But, when I just add the InterceptoRef tag in my action like the code below:

@InterceptorRefs({  
    @InterceptorRef("mylogging")  
}) 
public class LoginAction  implements ModelDriven{

It starts giving me exception

SEVERE: Exception starting filter struts2
Unable to load configuration. - [unknown location]
    at org.apache.struts2.dispatcher.Dispatcher.init(Dispatcher.java:431)
    at org.apache.struts2.dispatcher.ng.InitOperations.initDispatcher(InitOperations.java:69)
    at org.apache.struts2.dispatcher.ng.filter.StrutsPrepareAndExecuteFilter.init(StrutsPrepareAndExecuteFilter.java:51)
    at org.apache.catalina.core.ApplicationFilterConfig.initFilter(ApplicationFilterConfig.java:281)
    at org.apache.catalina.core.ApplicationFilterConfig.getFilter(ApplicationFilterConfig.java:262)
    at org.apache.catalina.core.ApplicationFilterConfig.<init>(ApplicationFilterConfig.java:107)
    at org.apache.catalina.core.StandardContext.filterStart(StandardContext.java:4746)
    at org.apache.catalina.core.StandardContext.startInternal(StandardContext.java:5399)
    at org.apache.catalina.util.LifecycleBase.start(LifecycleBase.java:150)
    at org.apache.catalina.core.ContainerBase.addChildInternal(ContainerBase.java:901)
    at org.apache.catalina.core.ContainerBase.addChild(ContainerBase.java:877)
    at org.apache.catalina.core.StandardHost.addChild(StandardHost.java:633)
    at org.apache.catalina.startup.HostConfig.deployWAR(HostConfig.java:977)
    at org.apache.catalina.startup.HostConfig$DeployWar.run(HostConfig.java:1654)
    at java.util.concurrent.Executors$RunnableAdapter.call(Executors.java:441)
    at java.util.concurrent.FutureTask$Sync.innerRun(FutureTask.java:303)
    at java.util.concurrent.FutureTask.run(FutureTask.java:138)
    at java.util.concurrent.ThreadPoolExecutor$Worker.runTask(ThreadPoolExecutor.java:886)
    at java.util.concurrent.ThreadPoolExecutor$Worker.run(ThreadPoolExecutor.java:908)
    at java.lang.Thread.run(Thread.java:662)
Caused by: Unable to load configuration. - [unknown location]
    at com.opensymphony.xwork2.config.ConfigurationManager.getConfiguration(ConfigurationManager.java:58)
    at org.apache.struts2.dispatcher.Dispatcher.init_PreloadConfiguration(Dispatcher.java:374)
    at org.apache.struts2.dispatcher.Dispatcher.init(Dispatcher.java:418)
    ... 19 more
Caused by: Unable to find interceptor class referenced by ref-name mylogging - [unknown location]

I am using Struts 2 with Struts2-convention-plugin , Hibernate, Spring and using Maven for dependency management.

I have following dependencies which I have defined in Maven's POM file:

            <dependency>
        <groupId>org.apache.struts</groupId>
        <artifactId>struts2-core</artifactId>
       <version>2.1.8.1</version>
        </dependency>

    <!-- Struts 2 + Spring plugins -->
<dependency>
    <groupId>org.apache.struts</groupId>
    <artifactId>struts2-spring-plugin</artifactId>
    <version>2.1.8.1</version>
</dependency>

          <!-- MySQL database driver -->
    <dependency>
        <groupId>mysql</groupId>
        <artifactId>mysql-connector-java</artifactId>
        <version>5.1.9</version>
    </dependency>
    <!-- Spring framework --> 
    <dependency>
        <groupId>org.springframework</groupId>
        <artifactId>spring</artifactId>
        <version>2.5.6</version>
    </dependency>
    <dependency>
        <groupId>org.springframework</groupId>
        <artifactId>spring-web</artifactId>
        <version>2.5.6</version>
    </dependency>
    <!-- Hibernate core -->
    <dependency>
    <groupId>asm</groupId>
    <artifactId>asm-all</artifactId>
    <version>3.3</version>
</dependency>
<dependency>
    <groupId>asm</groupId>
    <artifactId>asm</artifactId>
    <version>3.3</version>
</dependency>
   <dependency>
    <groupId>org.hibernate</groupId>
    <artifactId>hibernate-core</artifactId>
    <version>3.6.7.Final</version>
</dependency>
<dependency>
          <groupId>org.apache.struts</groupId>
      <artifactId>struts2-convention-plugin</artifactId>
      <version>2.1.8.1</version>
    </dependency>
          <dependency>
     <groupId>javax.servlet</groupId>
    <artifactId>javax.servlet-api</artifactId>
  <version>3.0.1</version>
    <scope>provided</scope>
</dependency>
          <dependency>
    <groupId>log4j</groupId>
    <artifactId>log4j</artifactId>
    <version>1.2.15</version>
</dependency>  

I have placed Struts.xml in the src root. So as far as I think there must be something missing in configuration.

Struts.xml file configuration:

<struts>
    <constant name="struts.devMode" value="false" />
     <constant name="struts.convention.package.locators.basePackage" value="com.abc.lab"/>
     <constant name="struts.convention.exclude.packages" value="org.apache.struts.*,org.apache.struts2.*,org.springframework.web.struts.*,org.springframework.web.struts2.*,org.hibernate.*,WarFileName.*"/>
     <constant name="struts.convention.action.checkImplementsAction" value="false"/>

<constant name="struts.convention.package.locators" value="action,actions,struts,struts2"/>
<package name="default" extends="struts-default" namespace="/">
     <interceptors>
            <interceptor name="mylogging" 
                class="com.abc.lab.interceptor.LoggingInterceptor">
            </interceptor>
            <interceptor-stack name="loggingStack">
                <interceptor-ref name="mylogging" />

                <interceptor-ref name="defaultStack" />    
            </interceptor-stack>
        </interceptors>
</package>
</struts>

Answer 1

If you get errors like "Unable to find interceptor class referenced by ref-name XYZ". This means that the package where Convention is placing your actions, does not extend the package where the interceptor is defined. To fix this problem either 1)Use @ParentPackage annotation(or struts.convention.default.parent.package) passing the name of the package that defines the interceptor, or 2) Create a package in XML that extends the package that defines the interceptor, and use @ParentPackage(or struts.convention.default.parent.package) to point to it.