i might not have described the problem as exact as needed. im already using a property file which is used on bootstrap ( set -P option ). i have declared some tokens in the jboss-service.xml files and in my oracle-ds.xml file. The tokens in the jboss-server.xml are properly parsed where as the onces in the oracle-ds.xml file are not touched. Eventually it looks to me like the bootstrap -P option does not work for any jca related configuration files. If this should be the case ( I could still made a mistake myself ) is there a way to let a jca adapter use a -ds.xml configuration file containing placeholders ???? thanks again for your help View the original post : http://www.jboss.com/index.html?module=bb&op=viewtopic&p=4073490#... Reply to the post : http://www.jboss.com/index.html?module=bb&op=posting&mode=reply&a...