JSP pages won't compile with java security manager enabled in tomcat6

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Environment

SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 11 Service Pack 3 (SLES 11 SP3)

Situation

Enabling security manager for tomcat causes JSP pages will not compile. Following error messages could be displayed:

org.apache.jasper.JasperException: Unable to compile class for JSP

or:

org.apache.jasper.JasperException: Unable to load class for JSP

Resolution

The following rule needs to be added to the /etc/tomcat6/catalina.policy file:

grant codeBase "file:/usr/share/java/ecj.jar" {

         permission java.security.AllPermission;

};

Cause

The default rules in the policy file shipped within tomcat6 contains a rule to grant the "AllPermissions" to the included libraries. On SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 11 these libraries
are not shipped within same rpm. Each library has it's own rpm package and are symlinked to
tomcat6 lib directory instead. The security manager grants the right to the symlink, but not the
original file as Java is unaware of OS specifics.

Disclaimer

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