Applying a Patch to WSO2 Products

Users apply various patches to the existing Carbon-based products to enhance the available features or to fix possible bugs that may rise on the Carbon-based application. As a result, applying patches is an easy approach to use when existing executable JAR files need to be changed on the server.

To apply a patch:

Insert the required patches to the respective <PRODUCT_HOME>/repository/components/patches directory:
For example: <ESB_HOME>/repository/components/patches
Run the patch.
```
wso2server.sh -DapplyPatches
```
When running this patch the following is the sequence of actions that take place:
- A backup folder named patch0000 gets created inside the <PRODUCT_HOME>/repository/components/patches directory containing the original content of the <PRODUCT_HOME>/repository/components/plugins folder. This step is executed as a precautionary measure so that if something goes wrong it is possible to revert to the previous state.
- The content of the patches directory will incrementally (e.g., patch0001, patch0002 etc.) get copied to the plugins directory.
  This process is only supported for components that have already existing JAR files in the plugins directory.