Tomcat

Tomcat is used as a server to run Java Servlets. It can be used stand alone or through Apache. Java Servlets is a great language which is very flexible. You can perform balance loading and connect to many great database engines such as postgres. There are many frameworks which you can use to speed up development and keep your code organised, a popular framework is 'struts'.

In this document I will explain how to setup jakarta-tomcat-5.5

Installation

Versions

The packages and version numbers I will be installing/working with here are:

FreeBSD 6.1

jakarta-tomcat-5.5.17_1

jakarta-struts 1.2.4

apache-ant-1.6.5_1

diablo-jdk-freebsd6.i386.1.5.0.07.00

PostgreSQL 8.1.4

KATE 2.5.3

Install Java

cd /usr/ports/java/diablo-jdk15/ && make install clean Java will require you to download a heap of files separately through the browser and place them in /usr/ports/distfiles

Install Tomcat

Install tomcat from ports as the post-install scripts help configure the system faster.

1. cd /usr/ports/*/tomcat55
2. make install

Install ANT

Used for compiling

1. pkg_add -r apache-ant

Configure

There is a lot of configuration and tests which you can do in tomcat. Here I'm going to show a basic setup in which you should be able to start some projects.

Startup

If you want all the servers to load up on boot here is what you have to add to /etc/rc.conf

tomcat55_enable="YES"
postgresql_enable="YES"

Setup Environment Variables

Editing /etc/profile

JAVA_HOME=/usr/local/diablo-jdk1.5.0; export JAVA_HOME
CATALINA_HOME="/usr/local/tomcat5.5"; export CATALINA_HOME
CATALINA_BASE="/usr/local/tomcat5.5"; export CATALINA_BASE
CATALINA_TMPDIR="/usr/local/tomcat5.5/temp"; export CATALINA_TMPDIR

CLASSPATH="/sbin:/bin:/usr/sbin:/usr/local/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/X11R6/bin:/usr/local/tomcat5.5/common/lib/servlet-api.jar:
/usr/local/tomcat5.5/common/lib/jsp-api.jar:.";export CLASSPATH

Tomcat Servlet Reloading

So that your modifications are automatically reloaded on your development box edit: /usr/local/tomcat5.5/conf/context.xml and change:

<Context>

to

<Context reloadable="true">

First time startup

To start the tomcat server for the first time here is what you do:

shell# cd /usr/local/tomcat5.5/bin
shell# bash
shell# JAVA_HOME=”/usr/local/diablo-jdk1.5.0”;export JAVA_HOME
shell# ./startup.sh

Using Tomcat

The default for tomcat is http://<ip>:8180 (used to be on port 8080)

The work area is /usr/local/tomcat5.5/webapps

You can enter project_name.war files into the webapps directory then access them like so:

http://<ip>:8180/project_name