Is there a way to run a method/class only on tomcat startup?

I have a need to remove temp files on tomcat startup, the pass to a folder which contains temp files is in applicationContext.xml

Is there a way to run a method/class only on tomcat startup?

From stackoverflow dcave555

• UPDATE: I had a temporary malfunction - you should use a ContextListener, not a SessionListener.

  From Hank Gay

• You could write a ServletContextListener which calls your method from the contextInitialized() method. You attach the listener to your webapp in web.xml, e.g.

  <listener>
     <listener-class>my.Listener</listener-class>
  </listener>
  

  and

  package my;
  
  public class Listener implements javax.servlet.ServletContextListener {
  
     public void contextInitialized(ServletContext context) {
        MyOtherClass.callMe();
     }
  }
  

  Strictly speaking, this is only run once on webapp startup, rather than tomcat startup, but that may amount to the same thing.

  From skaffman

• I'm sure there must be a better way to do it as part of the container's lifecycle (edit: Hank has the answer - I was wondering why he was suggesting a SessonListener before I answered), but you could create a Servlet which has no other purpose than to perform one-time actions when the server is started:

  <servlet>
    <description>Does stuff on container startup</description>
    <display-name>StartupServlet</display-name>
    <servlet-name>StartupServlet</servlet-name>
    <servlet-class>com.foo.bar.servlets.StartupServlet</servlet-class>
    <load-on-startup>1</load-on-startup>
  </servlet>
  

  skaffman : Before Servlet 2.4 (or was it 2.3?), that's what people did. But with the addition of context listeners, this is no longer necessary.

  insin : That's good tp know - a legacy application we're "refactoring" (it's not a rewrite from the ground up with a better framework and requirements changing all over the place, honest!) at the moment to run on a 2.4 container is still using this technique.
  From insin