Software development. And stuff.

Does SiteMesh work on Google AppEngine (Java preview)?

Short answer: Yes.

Longer answer: Yes. It does. So long as you check 2 things…

1. Upgrade

You need SiteMesh version 2.4.2 or greater. Earlier versions do not support AppEngine.

Download here

2. Disable static file serving

If you want decorators to be applied to static content (e.g. to .html files), the following needs to be added to WEB-INF/appengine-web.xml:

<static-files> 
  <exclude path="**"/> 
</static-files>

This forces the static resources to be served by the Servlet engine, rather than a separate static web-server. Without this, the files served by the static web server will not be decorated.

Happy AppEngining.