Webhcat server fails to start when starting from a directory which is inaccessible to the executing user

When I tried to start webhcat server:
[root@xxx ~]# sudo su hcat -c "/usr/lib/hcatalog/sbin/webhcat_server.sh start"

it failed to start with the following error in the logfile:
FATAL | 28 Dec 2012 13:41:38,090 | org.apache.hcatalog.templeton.Main | Server failed to start: templeton: Current working directory '.' does not exist!

The issue is that root's user home (/root) is inaccessible by the user "hcat". The workaround is to change the directory to one which hcat user can access and then run the command from there.

The problem lies in the check in the way we invoke the DefaultExecutor, which we are starting with no working directory set and so it uses the current working directory. I propose we make the work directory configurable and initialize it to executing user's home directory.