eclipse-pluginosgiapache-karafapache-felixequinox

How to make a resource file visible to all bundles in OSGi?


I'd like to include a resource file (e.g. some xml config file) in my bundle and make it visible to all other bundles in the container. Is it possible without using the Fragment-Host manifest header? I'd like this resource file to always be visible in the classpath of all bundles running alongside my bundle, even those that do not exist yet, but will potentially be added in future.

EDIT:

To clarify - that resource must be available passively, i.e. the other bundles should be able to find it in their classpath, and not by refering to any special API or service of my bundle.

Some more background - my environment is a bit messy but I have no control over it and cannot change its existing bundles. The only way I can modify it is by adding my own bundles. That environment includes several copies of the ch.qos.logback.classic bundle. When logback starts up, it looks for specific XML config files in the classpath. If it doesn't find any of them, then its default behaviour is to print everything to stdout with debug level. This environment was previously used to host a GUI application so it didn't matter that much before, but now I am trying to adapt it so I can use some of its functionality in headless mode. So now it becomes important to me to be able to configure it in such a way that only warning and errors are printed to the console.


Solution

  • In general, no you cannot do this. Class-space isolation is at the heart of OSGi, but you want to put a resource in the class loader of one bundle and make it visible to all other bundles. That's not OSGi, it's the global application classpath.

    The only thing you can do to add to the internal classpath of a specific bundle is to write a fragment which attaches to that bundle. A fragment can attach to multiple host bundles, but only if those hosts have the same symbolic name, i.e. because they are different versions of the same bundle. See OSGi R6 Core Specification, section 3.14.

    You did however state that the bundles you want to attach are all copies of ch.qos.logback.classic. If that means they all have that exact symbolic name then perhaps a fragment will work after all.