Add a properties file to IntelliJ's classpath

Try this:

• Go to Project Structure.
• Select your module.
• Find the folder in the tree on the right and select it.
• Click the Sources button above that tree (with the blue folder) to make that folder a sources folder.

Actually, you have at least 2 ways to do it, the first way is described by ColinD, you just configure the "resources" folder as Sources folder in IDEA. If the Resource Patterns contains the extension of your resource, then it will be copied to the output directory when you Make the project and output directory is automatically a classpath of your application.

Another common way is to add the "resources" folder to the classpath directly. Go to Project Structure | Modules | Your Module | Dependencies, click Add, Single-Entry Module Library, specify the path to the "resources" folder.

Yet another solution would be to put the log4j.properties file directly under the Source root of your project (in the default package directory). It's the same as the first way except you don't need to add another Source root in the Module Paths settings, the file will be copied to the output directory on Make.

If you want to test with different log4j configurations, it may be easier to specify a custom configuration file directly in the Run/Debug configuration, VM parameters filed like:

-Dlog4j.configuration=file:/c:/log4j.properties.

I have the same problem and it annoys me tremendously!!

I have always thought I was surposed to do as answer 2. That used to work in Intellij 9 (now using 10).

However I figured out that by adding these line to my maven pom file helps:

<build>
  ...
  <resources>
    <resource>
      <directory>src/main/resources</directory>
    </resource>
  </resources>
  ...
</build>