DZone
Thanks for visiting DZone today,
Edit Profile
  • Manage Email Subscriptions
  • How to Post to DZone
  • Article Submission Guidelines
Sign Out View Profile
  • Post an Article
  • Manage My Drafts
Over 2 million developers have joined DZone.
Log In / Join
Refcards Trend Reports Events Over 2 million developers have joined DZone. Join Today! Thanks for visiting DZone today,
Edit Profile Manage Email Subscriptions Moderation Admin Console How to Post to DZone Article Submission Guidelines
View Profile
Sign Out
Refcards
Trend Reports
Events
Zones
Culture and Methodologies Agile Career Development Methodologies Team Management
Data Engineering AI/ML Big Data Data Databases IoT
Software Design and Architecture Cloud Architecture Containers Integration Microservices Performance Security
Coding Frameworks Java JavaScript Languages Tools
Testing, Deployment, and Maintenance Deployment DevOps and CI/CD Maintenance Monitoring and Observability Testing, Tools, and Frameworks
Culture and Methodologies
Agile Career Development Methodologies Team Management
Data Engineering
AI/ML Big Data Data Databases IoT
Software Design and Architecture
Cloud Architecture Containers Integration Microservices Performance Security
Coding
Frameworks Java JavaScript Languages Tools
Testing, Deployment, and Maintenance
Deployment DevOps and CI/CD Maintenance Monitoring and Observability Testing, Tools, and Frameworks
  1. DZone
  2. Coding
  3. Frameworks
  4. Including Java Agent in Standalone Spring Boot Application

Including Java Agent in Standalone Spring Boot Application

Jakub Kubrynski user avatar by
Jakub Kubrynski
·
Jan. 07, 15 · Tutorial
Like (1)
Save
Tweet
Share
31.44K Views

Join the DZone community and get the full member experience.

Join For Free

Recently at DevSKiller.com we've decided to move majority of our stuff to simple containers. It was pretty easy due to use of Spring Boot uber-jars, but the problem was in NewRelic agents which should have to be included separately. That caused uncomfortable situation so we decided to solve it by including NewRelic agent into our uber-jar applications. If you also want to simplify your life please follow provided instructions :)

At first we have to add proper dependency into our pom.xml descriptor:

<dependency>
  <groupiId>com.newrelic.agent.java<<groupId>
  <artifactId>newrelic-agent</artifactId>
  <version>3.12.1</version>
  <scope>provided</scope>
</dependency>

Now since we have proper jar included into our project it's time to unpack the dependency to have all necessary classes in our application jar file:

<plugin>
  <groupId>org.apache.maven.plugins</groupId>
  <artifactId>maven-dependency-plugin</artifactId>
  <version>2.9</version>
  <executions>
    <execution>
      <phase>prepare-package</phase>
      <goals>
         <goal>unpack-dependencies</goal>
      </goals>
      <configuration>
        <includeArtifactIds>newrelic-agent</includeArtifactIds>
        <outputDirectory>${project.build.outputDirectory}</outputDirectory>
      </configuration>
    </execution>
  </executions>
</plugin>

After this step we've all agent related classes accessible directly from our jar. But still the file cannot be used as an agent jar. There are some important manifest entries that have to be present in every agent jar. The most important is the Premain-Class attribute specifying main agent class including premain() method. In case of NewRelic it's also important to include Can-Redefine-Classes and Can-Retransform-Classes attributes. The easiest way to do that is to extend maven-jar-plugin configuration:

<plugin>
  <groupId>org.apache.maven.plugins</groupId>
  <artifactId>maven-jar-plugin</artifactId>
  <version>2.5</version>
  <configuration>
    <archive>
      <manifestEntries>
        <Premain-Class>com.newrelic.bootstrap.BootstrapAgent</Premain-Class>
        <Can-Redefine-Classes>true</Can-Redefine-Classes>
        <Can-Retransform-Classes>true</Can-Retransform-Classes>
      </manifestEntries>
    </archive>
  </configuration>
</plugin>

Now is coming the tricky part :) NewRelic agent also contains class with main() method which causes that Spring Boot repackager plugin is unable to find single main() method so build fails. It's not a problem but we have to remember to specify proper main class in spring-boot-maven-plugin (or in gradle plugin):

<configuration>
  <mainClass>my.custom.Application</mainClass>
</configuration>

That's all! You can execute your application with following command:

java -javaagent:myapp.jar -jar myapp.jar
Last but not least: don't forget to include NewRelic configuration file (newrelic.yml) in the same directory as your application jar. The other solution is to set newrelic.config.file system property to point the fully qualified file name.
Spring Framework Spring Boot application Java (programming language)

Published at DZone with permission of Jakub Kubrynski, DZone MVB. See the original article here.

Opinions expressed by DZone contributors are their own.

Popular on DZone

  • Taming Cloud Costs With Infracost
  • Top 5 PHP REST API Frameworks
  • The Importance of Delegation in Management Teams
  • Beginners’ Guide to Run a Linux Server Securely

Comments

Partner Resources

X

ABOUT US

  • About DZone
  • Send feedback
  • Careers
  • Sitemap

ADVERTISE

  • Advertise with DZone

CONTRIBUTE ON DZONE

  • Article Submission Guidelines
  • Become a Contributor
  • Visit the Writers' Zone

LEGAL

  • Terms of Service
  • Privacy Policy

CONTACT US

  • 600 Park Offices Drive
  • Suite 300
  • Durham, NC 27709
  • support@dzone.com
  • +1 (919) 678-0300

Let's be friends: