I am trying to configure Hibernate to use a global (specified in tomcat server.xml GlobalNamingResources) JNDI supplied DBCP DataSource.

I know that Tomcat is properly configured w/o Hibernate because I was able to run a test JSP that gets connection from JNDI.

config.buildSessionFactory() says:

INFO: Not binding factory to JNDI, no JNDI name configured

I have spend quite a while trying various permutations of
connection.datasource. Any help would be appreciated.

Hibernate version: 2.1?

Mapping documents:
props.put("connection.datasource","java:comp/env/jdbc/cm");
props.put("hibernate.dialect","net.sf.hibernate.dialect.MySQLDialect");

tomcat server.xml:
<GlobalNamingResources>...
<Resource name="jdbc/cm" auth="Container" type="javax.sql.DataSource"/>
<ResourceParams name="jdbc/cm">
<parameter>
<name>factory</name>
<value>org.apache.commons.dbcp.BasicDataSourceFactory</value>
</parameter>
<parameter>
<name>url</name>
<value>jdbc:mysql://localhost:3306/nav_db</value>
</parameter>
<parameter>
<name>driverClassName</name>
<value>com.mysql.jdbc.Driver</value>
</parameter>
<parameter>
<name>username</name>
<value>portal</value>
</parameter>
<parameter>
<name>password</name>
<value>B0bbyR4h4l</value>
</parameter>
<parameter>
<name>maxWait</name>
<value>3000</value>
</parameter>
<parameter>
<name>maxIdle</name>
<value>100</value>
</parameter>
<parameter>
<name>maxActive</name>
<value>10</value>
</parameter>
</ResourceParams>

.....

<Host ...

<Context path="/auto_admin" docBase="auto_admin">
<ResourceLink
name="jdbc/cm"
global="jdbc/cm"
type="javax.sql.DataSource" />
</Context>


Name and version of the database you are using:
mysql Ver 11.18 Distrib 3.23.58, for redhat-linux-gnu (i386)

No error, I assume?
Nothing is wrong. As the message states, it is not binding the factory to JNDI, because Tomcat has a read-only JNDI. Don't worry about this.
Whether it retrieves the DataSource from JNDI is another issue, and from your test it seems it does.
As for using DHCP, there is a great deal of discussion in the forums about this. the general consensus is to use C3P0 or Proxool instead.

thanks mgreer, i switched to c3p0. works great.