Spring Boot using log4j2 in Eclipse - NoClassDefFoundError Logback - eclipse

Question

I have a project that uses Spring Boot with log4j2 which works fine as a standalone jar but not as a java application (nor as a Spring boot application) in eclipse.
Here is what the pom looks like :
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<project xmlns="http://maven.apache.org/POM/4.0.0"
xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
xsi:schemaLocation="http://maven.apache.org/POM/4.0.0 http://maven.apache.org/xsd/maven-4.0.0.xsd">
<modelVersion>4.0.0</modelVersion>
<artifactId>test-artifact</artifactId>
<version>1.0.0</version>
<name>myApp</name>
<description>My Application</description>
<dependencyManagement>
<dependencies>
<dependency>
<groupId>org.springframework.boot</groupId>
<artifactId>spring-boot-dependencies</artifactId>
<version>1.5.21.RELEASE</version>
<type>pom</type>
<scope>import</scope>
</dependency>
</dependencies>
</dependencyManagement>
<properties>
<java.version>1.8</java.version>
</properties>
<dependencies>
<dependency>
<groupId>org.springframework.boot</groupId>
<artifactId>spring-boot-starter-web</artifactId>
<exclusions>
<exclusion>
<groupId>org.springframework.boot</groupId>
<artifactId>spring-boot-starter-logging</artifactId>
</exclusion>
</exclusions>
</dependency>
<dependency>
<groupId>org.springframework.boot</groupId>
<artifactId>spring-boot-starter-hateoas</artifactId>
</dependency>
<dependency>
<groupId>org.springframework.boot</groupId>
<artifactId>spring-boot-starter-actuator</artifactId>
</dependency>
<dependency>
<groupId>org.springframework.boot</groupId>
<artifactId>spring-boot-starter-test</artifactId>
<scope>test</scope>
</dependency>
<dependency>
<groupId>org.springframework.boot</groupId>
<artifactId>spring-boot-starter-log4j2</artifactId>
</dependency>
<dependency>
<groupId>org.springframework</groupId>
<artifactId>spring-expression</artifactId>
</dependency>
<!-- CAMEL DEPENDENCIES -->
<dependency>
<groupId>org.apache.camel</groupId>
<artifactId>camel-spring-boot-starter</artifactId>
</dependency>
<dependency>
<groupId>org.apache.camel</groupId>
<artifactId>camel-jms</artifactId>
</dependency>
<dependency>
<groupId>org.apache.activemq</groupId>
<artifactId>activemq-camel</artifactId>
</dependency>
<!-- ACTIVEMQ DEPENDENCIES -->
<dependency>
<groupId>org.springframework.boot</groupId>
<artifactId>spring-boot-starter-activemq</artifactId>
</dependency>
<dependency>
<groupId>org.apache.camel</groupId>
<artifactId>camel-test-spring</artifactId>
<scope>test</scope>
</dependency>
<dependency>
<groupId>commons-collections</groupId>
<artifactId>commons-collections</artifactId>
</dependency>
<dependency>
<groupId>commons-lang</groupId>
<artifactId>commons-lang</artifactId>
</dependency>
<dependency>
<groupId>com.fasterxml.jackson.core</groupId>
<artifactId>jackson-databind</artifactId>
</dependency>
<dependency>
<groupId>org.projectlombok</groupId>
<artifactId>lombok</artifactId>
</dependency>
<dependency>
<groupId>org.slf4j</groupId>
<artifactId>slf4j-api</artifactId>
</dependency>
<dependency>
<groupId>org.apache.logging.log4j</groupId>
<artifactId>log4j-slf4j-impl</artifactId>
</dependency>
<dependency>
<groupId>org.apache.logging.log4j</groupId>
<artifactId>log4j-web</artifactId>
</dependency>
<dependency>
<groupId>com.oracle.jdbc</groupId>
<artifactId>ojdbc8</artifactId>
</dependency>
<dependency>
<groupId>com.oracle.xdb</groupId>
<artifactId>oracle.xdb</artifactId>
<version>${oracle.xdb.version}</version>
<scope>test</scope>
</dependency>
<dependency>
<groupId>commons-digester</groupId>
<artifactId>commons-digester</artifactId>
<exclusions>
<exclusion>
<groupId>commons-logging</groupId>
<artifactId>commons-logging</artifactId>
</exclusion>
</exclusions>
</dependency>
<dependency>
<groupId>com.google.code.gson</groupId>
<artifactId>gson</artifactId>
</dependency>
<dependency>
<groupId>commons-codec</groupId>
<artifactId>commons-codec</artifactId>
<version>${commons-codec.version}</version>
</dependency>
<dependency>
<groupId>com.googlecode.json-simple</groupId>
<artifactId>json-simple</artifactId>
</dependency>
</dependencies>
<build>
<plugins>
<plugin>
<groupId>org.springframework.boot</groupId>
<artifactId>spring-boot-maven-plugin</artifactId>
<configuration>
<mainClass>my.main.springApplication</mainClass>
</configuration>
<executions>
<execution>
<goals>
<goal>repackage</goal>
</goals>
</execution>
</executions>
</plugin>
</plugins>
</build>
</project>
The error that I get is :
Exception in thread "main" java.lang.NoClassDefFoundError: ch/qos/logback/classic/Level
at org.springframework.boot.logging.logback.LogbackLoggingSystem.<clinit>(LogbackLoggingSystem.java:66)
at sun.reflect.NativeConstructorAccessorImpl.newInstance0(Native Method)
at sun.reflect.NativeConstructorAccessorImpl.newInstance(NativeConstructorAccessorImpl.java:62)
at sun.reflect.DelegatingConstructorAccessorImpl.newInstance(DelegatingConstructorAccessorImpl.java:45)
at java.lang.reflect.Constructor.newInstance(Constructor.java:422)
at org.springframework.boot.logging.LoggingSystem.get(LoggingSystem.java:170)
at org.springframework.boot.logging.LoggingSystem.get(LoggingSystem.java:160)
at org.springframework.boot.logging.LoggingApplicationListener.onApplicationStartingEvent(LoggingApplicationListener.java:230)
at org.springframework.boot.logging.LoggingApplicationListener.onApplicationEvent(LoggingApplicationListener.java:210)
at org.springframework.context.event.SimpleApplicationEventMulticaster.doInvokeListener(SimpleApplicationEventMulticaster.java:172)
at org.springframework.context.event.SimpleApplicationEventMulticaster.invokeListener(SimpleApplicationEventMulticaster.java:165)
at org.springframework.context.event.SimpleApplicationEventMulticaster.multicastEvent(SimpleApplicationEventMulticaster.java:139)
at org.springframework.context.event.SimpleApplicationEventMulticaster.multicastEvent(SimpleApplicationEventMulticaster.java:122)
at org.springframework.boot.context.event.EventPublishingRunListener.starting(EventPublishingRunListener.java:69)
at org.springframework.boot.SpringApplicationRunListeners.starting(SpringApplicationRunListeners.java:48)
at org.springframework.boot.SpringApplication.run(SpringApplication.java:292)
at org.springframework.boot.SpringApplication.run(SpringApplication.java:1118)
at org.springframework.boot.SpringApplication.run(SpringApplication.java:1107)
at my.main.springApplication.main(StagingApplication.java:23)
Caused by: java.lang.ClassNotFoundException: ch.qos.logback.classic.Level
at java.net.URLClassLoader.findClass(URLClassLoader.java:381)
at java.lang.ClassLoader.loadClass(ClassLoader.java:424)
at sun.misc.Launcher$AppClassLoader.loadClass(Launcher.java:331)
at java.lang.ClassLoader.loadClass(ClassLoader.java:357)
... 19 more
Here is what I have tried already:
I tried to delete my M2 repo and reinstall all the dependencies.
I tried to add the logback-classic jar but this led to a conflict of between the 2 logging implementations.
I tried to run mvn eclipse:eclipse
But none of these hacks worked.
Any suggestions?

Answer 1

Turns out that the project in question here had the exclusion, but the parent project did not. This is why eclipse would not exclude the logback jars. Once the exclusion tags were shifted to the parent project's POM, things worked just fine both as a Java Application and as a Spring boot project (using spring tools).