Exception in Application start method java.lang.reflect.InvocationTargetException

I am just starting out with JavaFX, and I am trying to build a simple application with a label, text field and button which, when clicked, sets the label’s value to that of the text field’s. Everything was going well until I connected the controller to the Main file. Here’s my code:

Main.java

package application;

import java.io.IOException;

import javafx.application.Application;
import javafx.fxml.FXMLLoader;
import javafx.stage.Stage;
import javafx.scene.Scene;
import javafx.scene.layout.AnchorPane;


public class Main extends Application {

    private Stage primaryStage;

    @Override
    public void start(Stage primaryStage) {
        this.primaryStage = primaryStage; // connect primary stage
        mainWindow();
    }

    // main window
    public void mainWindow() {
        try {
            // view
            FXMLLoader loader = new FXMLLoader(Main.class.getResource("/MainWindowView.fxml"));
            AnchorPane pane = loader.load();

            // controller
            MainWindowController mainWindowController = loader.getController();
            mainWindowController.setMain(this);

            // scene on stage
            Scene scene = new Scene(pane);
            primaryStage.setScene(scene);
            primaryStage.show();

        } catch (IOException e) {
            e.printStackTrace();
        }
    }

    public static void main(String[] args) {
        launch(args);
    }
}

MainWindowView.fxml

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>

<?import javafx.scene.text.*?>
<?import javafx.scene.control.*?>
<?import java.lang.*?>
<?import javafx.scene.layout.*?>
<?import javafx.scene.layout.AnchorPane?>

<AnchorPane prefHeight="400.0" prefWidth="600.0" xmlns="http://javafx.com/javafx/8" xmlns:fx="http://javafx.com/fxml/1" fx:controller="application.MainWindowController">
   <children>
      <Label fx:id="label" alignment="CENTER" layoutX="291.0" layoutY="164.0" text="Label" AnchorPane.leftAnchor="0.0" AnchorPane.rightAnchor="0.0">
         <font>
            <Font size="20.0" />
         </font>
      </Label>
      <HBox alignment="CENTER" layoutX="201.0" layoutY="208.0" spacing="20.0" AnchorPane.leftAnchor="0.0" AnchorPane.rightAnchor="0.0">
         <children>
            <TextField fx:id="field" layoutX="201.0" layoutY="208.0" />
            <Button layoutX="381.0" layoutY="208.0" mnemonicParsing="false" onAction="#handleButton" text="Change Text" />
         </children>
      </HBox>
   </children>
</AnchorPane>

MainWindowController.java

package application;

import javafx.fxml.FXML;
import javafx.scene.control.Label;
import javafx.scene.control.TextField;

public class MainWindowController {

    // views
    @FXML private Label label;
    @FXML private TextField field;

    private Main main;

    // connect main class to controller
    public void setMain(Main main) {
        this.main = main; 
    }

    // assign text field text to label on button click
    public void handleButton() {
        String text = field.getText();
        label.setText(text);
        field.clear();
    }
}

I have tried multiple answers found on StackOverflow, but all that I have found were from 2 years ago and did not make any positive effect on my code.

EDIT: Stack trace here:

Exception in Application start method
java.lang.reflect.InvocationTargetException
    at sun.reflect.NativeMethodAccessorImpl.invoke0(Native Method)
    at sun.reflect.NativeMethodAccessorImpl.invoke(NativeMethodAccessorImpl.java:62)
    at sun.reflect.DelegatingMethodAccessorImpl.invoke(DelegatingMethodAccessorImpl.java:43)
    at java.lang.reflect.Method.invoke(Method.java:497)
    at com.sun.javafx.application.LauncherImpl.launchApplicationWithArgs(LauncherImpl.java:389)
    at com.sun.javafx.application.LauncherImpl.launchApplication(LauncherImpl.java:328)
    at sun.reflect.NativeMethodAccessorImpl.invoke0(Native Method)
    at sun.reflect.NativeMethodAccessorImpl.invoke(NativeMethodAccessorImpl.java:62)
    at sun.reflect.DelegatingMethodAccessorImpl.invoke(DelegatingMethodAccessorImpl.java:43)
    at java.lang.reflect.Method.invoke(Method.java:497)
    at sun.launcher.LauncherHelper$FXHelper.main(LauncherHelper.java:767)
Caused by: java.lang.RuntimeException: Exception in Application start method
    at com.sun.javafx.application.LauncherImpl.launchApplication1(LauncherImpl.java:917)
    at com.sun.javafx.application.LauncherImpl.lambda$launchApplication$155(LauncherImpl.java:182)
    at java.lang.Thread.run(Thread.java:745)
Caused by: java.lang.IllegalStateException: Location is not set.
    at javafx.fxml.FXMLLoader.loadImpl(FXMLLoader.java:2434)
    at javafx.fxml.FXMLLoader.load(FXMLLoader.java:2409)
    at application.Main.mainWindow(Main.java:27)
    at application.Main.start(Main.java:19)
    at com.sun.javafx.application.LauncherImpl.lambda$launchApplication1$162(LauncherImpl.java:863)
    at com.sun.javafx.application.PlatformImpl.lambda$runAndWait$175(PlatformImpl.java:326)
    at com.sun.javafx.application.PlatformImpl.lambda$null$173(PlatformImpl.java:295)
    at java.security.AccessController.doPrivileged(Native Method)
    at com.sun.javafx.application.PlatformImpl.lambda$runLater$174(PlatformImpl.java:294)
    at com.sun.glass.ui.InvokeLaterDispatcher$Future.run(InvokeLaterDispatcher.java:95)
Exception running application application.Main

Answer

For anyone who has this exact same problem in the future, as James_D and the other answer contributors mentioned, removing the “/” at the beginning of the path fixes the problem so use

FXMLLoader loader = new FXMLLoader(Main.class.getResource("MainWindowView.fxml"));

instead of

FXMLLoader loader = new FXMLLoader(Main.class.getResource("/MainWindowView.fxml"));

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Answer