Invert Your Mind

Found a way to do this in a single line. Works nicely.

eval "last=\\${$#}"

No dist upgrade. On Ubuntu (debian):

update-manager -c

On all the rest:

want the latest and greatest? Good luck dude!

Looks like Gusty (or something) changes some of the installation for Tomcat 5.5 and it requires some work to get back to normal. Here’s my changes thus far:

sudo rm /usr/share/tomcat5.5/common/endorsed/*
cd /usr/share/tomcat5.5/common/lib
sudo apt-get install libmysql-java
sudo ln -s /usr/share/java/mysql-connector-java.jar

This fist off removes the bad XML jar files that Tomcat is setup with in its endorsed directory. These assume that you only need a subset of JAXP and don’t provide everything (i.e. XSLT). You could also symlink to the rest of the XML jars in /usr/share/java such as xalan2.jar, but I find that the bundled JAXP in the JDK (sun-java6-*) work much better.

The second part symlinks in MySQL drivers into the main installation. This is required if you are going to be setting up JDBC connection pools inside the Tomcat contexts to a MySQL database.

These are it thus far, but if I find more I’ll update this.

I’m spent about 6 hours total working on getting multiple instance of Tomcat to run on Ubuntu and finally wrote some scripts that I’d like to share with folks. These scripts do the following:

1. Setup the box to host multiple instances (JVMs) running tomcat

This process cleans the old layout and sets up a new layout that allows for multiple instances. This includes a number of “instances” directories in /var/lib/tomcat5.5, /etc/defaults/tomat5.5 (a new directory) and /var/log/tomcat5.5.

2. Create new instances

This allows you to setup a new instance quickly. It creates all the necessary directories and also installs the new instance into the init scripts an run levels.

Things the scripts don’t do:

- Setup multiple mod_jk configurations and apache virtual hosts
- Any SSL or security management

Here’s how to use the scripts:

1. First make sure you have Java and Tomcat installed!

bash$ sudo apt-get install sun-java6-jdk tomcat5.5

2. Grab ALL of the scripts and place them in some directory (anywhere is fine)

3. Run the multiple-instances.sh script as root from the directory you put it in

bash$ sudo ./multiple-instances.sh

4. Run the new-instance.sh script to create a new instance

bash$ new-instance.sh <instance-name>

5. Configure the new server by editing the files in /var/lib/tomcat5.5/instances/<instance-name> (mainly conf/server.xml)

6. Make sure each instance has a unique port for everything including the AJP, all listeners and the container

7. Fire it up!

bash$ sudo /etc/init.d/tomcat5.5_<instance-name> start

8. Check the logs in /var/log/tomcat5.5/instances/<instance-name>/catalina.out

Due to security considerations, I’ve included the scripts inline. Any comments are welcome:

multiple-instances.sh

#!/bin/bash

# Verify we are root
if [ "$USER" != "root" ]; then
  echo "You must run this script as root"
  exit 1
fi

# Shutdown any running instace
if ! /etc/init.d/tomcat5.5 stop; then
  echo "Unable to stop the running tomcat instance. Please stop it before running this script."
  exit 1
fi

# Copy over the tomcat.sh file before we change directories
if [ ! -f tomcat.sh ]; then
  echo "The tomcat.sh file is missing. It must be in the current directory so it can be placed"
  echo "into the new layout"
  exit 1
fi
cp tomcat.sh /etc/tomcat5.5
chmod go-wx /etc/tomcat5.5/tomcat.sh

# Now, head out and clean up
if ! cd /var/lib/tomcat5.5; then
  echo "You must first install tomcat from the apt repository"
  exit 1
fi

# Make the instances layout
mkdir instances
chown -R tomcat55:nogroup instances
chmod -R o-rwx instances
chmod -R g+w instances

# Clean up old layout
rm work
rm -rf webapps
rmdir temp
rmdir shared/classes
rmdir shared/lib
rmdir shared
rm logs
rm -rf conf

cd /usr/share/tomcat5.5
rm conf
rm logs
rm shared
rm temp
rm work

# Clean up defaults for the template script
cd /etc/default/
mv tomcat5.5 tomcat-bak
mkdir -p tomcat5.5/instances tomcat5.5/template
mv tomcat-bak tomcat5.5/template/tomcat5.5
chown -R root:root tomcat5.5
chmod -R go-w tomcat5.5
chmod -R g+r tomcat5.5

# Clean up the logs
cd /var/log/tomcat5.5
mkdir old
mv * old
mkdir instances
chown -R tomcat55:nogroup *
chmod -R o-rwx old instances
chmod -R g+w old instances

# Remove the old init script and turn off all script links for the run levels
rm /etc/init.d/tomcat5.5
update-rc.d -f tomcat5.5 remove

echo "Successfully setup the machine for multiple tomcat instances and cleaned up the single instance layout"

new-instance.sh

#!/bin/bash

if [ "$USER" != "root" ]; then
  echo "You must run this script as root"
  exit 1
fi

if [ $# != 1 ]; then
  echo "Usage: new-instance.sh "
  exit 1
fi

# Setup the instance
cd /var/lib/tomcat5.5/instances
if [ -d $1 ]; then
  echo "Instance $1 already created."
  exit 1
fi
mkdir $1

cd $1
mkdir conf webapps bin temp
if ! cp /etc/tomcat5.5/web.xml conf; then
  echo "Unable to create new instance $1 because /etc/tomcat5.5/web.xml doesn't appear to exist"
  exit 1
fi

if ! cp /etc/tomcat5.5/server.xml conf; then
  echo "Unable to create new instance $1 because /etc/tomcat5.5/server.xml doesn't appear to exist"
  exit 1
fi

if ! sed "s/@INSTANCE_NAME@/$1/g" /etc/tomcat5.5/tomcat.sh > bin/tomcat.sh; then
  echo "Unable to find the custom tomcat.sh file in /etc/tomcat5.5. This file must exist."
  exit 1
fi
chown -R tomcat55:nogroup /var/lib/tomcat5.5/instances/$1
chmod -R o-rwx /var/lib/tomcat5.5/instances/$1
chmod -R g+w /var/lib/tomcat5.5/instances/$1
chmod ug+rx bin/tomcat.sh

# Setup the logs
mkdir /var/log/tomcat5.5/instances/$1
chown -R tomcat55:nogroup /var/log/tomcat5.5/instances/$1
chmod -R o-rwx /var/log/tomcat5.5/instances/$1
chmod -R g+w /var/log/tomcat5.5/instances/$1
ln -s /var/log/tomcat5.5/instances/$1 logs

# Create catalina.policy (for the security manager)
echo "// This file is an example of a policy file. You can edit this file for the specific instance" > conf/catalina.policy.example
echo ""  >> conf/catalina.policy.example
cat /etc/tomcat5.5/policy.d/*.policy >> conf/catalina.policy.example
chown tomcat55:nogroup conf/catalina.policy.example
chmod o-rwx conf/catalina.policy.example
chmod g+w conf/catalina.policy.example

# Setup auto start
ln -s /var/lib/tomcat5.5/instances/$1/bin/tomcat.sh /etc/init.d/tomcat5.5_$1
update-rc.d tomcat5.5_$1 defaults 90

tomcat.sh

#!/bin/sh
#
# /etc/init.d/tomcat5.5 -- startup script for the Tomcat 5 servlet engine
#
# Written by Miquel van Smoorenburg .
# Modified for Debian GNU/Linux	by Ian Murdock .
# Modified for Tomcat by Stefan Gybas .
#
### BEGIN INIT INFO
# Provides:          tomcat
# Required-Start:    $local_fs $remote_fs $network
# Required-Stop:     $local_fs $remote_fs $network
# Should-Start:      $named
# Should-Stop:       $named
# Default-Start:     2 3 4 5
# Default-Stop:      0 1 6
# Short-Description: Start Tomcat.
# Description:       Start the Tomcat servlet engine.
### END INIT INFO

set -e

PATH=/bin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/usr/sbin
NAME=tomcat5.5
DESC="Tomcat servlet engine"
DAEMON=/usr/bin/jsvc
CATALINA_HOME=/usr/share/$NAME
INSTANCE_NAME=@INSTANCE_NAME@
DEFAULT=/etc/default/$NAME/instances/$INSTANCE_NAME

. /lib/lsb/init-functions
. /etc/default/rcS

# The following variables can be overwritten in $DEFAULT

# Run Tomcat 5 as this user ID
TOMCAT5_USER=tomcat55

# The first existing directory is used for JAVA_HOME (if JAVA_HOME is not
# defined in $DEFAULT)
JDK_DIRS="/usr/lib/jvm/java-6-sun /usr/lib/jvm/java-1.5.0-sun /usr/lib/j2sdk1.4-sun /usr/lib/j2sdk1.4-blackdown /usr/lib/j2se/1.4 /usr/lib/j2sdk1.5-sun /usr/lib/j2sdk1.3-sun /usr/lib/j2sdk1.3-blackdown /usr/lib/j2sdk1.5-ibm /usr/lib/j2sdk1.4-ibm /usr/lib/jvm/java-gcj /usr/lib/kaffe"

# Directory for per-instance configuration files and webapps
CATALINA_BASE=/var/lib/tomcat5.5/instances/$INSTANCE_NAME

# Use the Java security manager? (yes/no)
TOMCAT5_SECURITY=no

# Timeout in seconds for the shutdown of all webapps
TOMCAT5_SHUTDOWN=30

# End of variables that can be overwritten in $DEFAULT

# overwrite settings from default file
if [ -f "$DEFAULT" ]; then
	. "$DEFAULT"
fi

test -f $DAEMON || exit 0

[ -z "$TOMCAT5_USER" ] && TOMCAT5_USER=tomcat55

# Look for the right JVM to use
for jdir in $JDK_DIRS; do
	if [ -r "$jdir/bin/java" -a -z "${JAVA_HOME}" ]; then
		JAVA_HOME_TMP="$jdir"
		# checks for a real JDK like environment, needed to check if
		# really the java-gcj-compat-dev package is installed
		if [ -r "$jdir/bin/jdb" ]; then
			JAVA_HOME="$JAVA_HOME_TMP"
		fi
	fi
done
export JAVA_HOME

# Set java.awt.headless=true if JAVA_OPTS is not set so the
# Xalan XSL transformer can work without X11 display on JDK 1.4+
# It also looks like the default heap size of 64M is not enough for most cases
# se the maximum heap size is set to 128M
if [ -z "$JAVA_OPTS" ]; then
	JAVA_OPTS="-Djava.awt.headless=true -Xmx128M"
fi

JAVA_OPTS="$JAVA_OPTS -Djava.endorsed.dirs=$CATALINA_HOME/common/endorsed -Dcatalina.base=$CATALINA_BASE -Dcatalina.home=$CATALINA_HOME -Djava.io.tmpdir=$CATALINA_BASE/temp"

# Set the JSP compiler if set in the tomcat5.5.default file
if [ -n "$JSP_COMPILER" ]; then
	JAVA_OPTS="$JAVA_OPTS -Dbuild.compiler=$JSP_COMPILER"
fi

if [ "$TOMCAT5_SECURITY" = "yes" ]; then
	JAVA_OPTS="$JAVA_OPTS -Djava.security.manager -Djava.security.policy=$CATALINA_BASE/conf/catalina.policy"
fi

# juli LogManager disabled if running under libgcj (see bug #395167)
gcj=no
"$JAVA_HOME/bin/java" -version 2>&1 | grep -q "^gij (GNU libgcj)" && gcj=yes
if [ "$gcj" != "yes" ]; then
  JAVA_OPTS="$JAVA_OPTS -Djava.util.logging.manager=org.apache.juli.ClassLoaderLogManager -Djava.util.logging.config.file=$CATALINA_BASE/conf/logging.properties"
fi

# Define other required variables
CATALINA_PID="/var/run/$NAME-$INSTANCE_NAME.pid"
LOGFILE="$CATALINA_BASE/logs/catalina.out"
BOOTSTRAP_CLASS=org.apache.catalina.startup.Bootstrap
JSVC_CLASSPATH="/usr/share/java/commons-daemon.jar:$CATALINA_HOME/bin/bootstrap.jar"

# Look for Java Secure Sockets Extension (JSSE) JARs
if [ -z "${JSSE_HOME}" -a -r "${JAVA_HOME}/jre/lib/jsse.jar" ]; then
    JSSE_HOME="${JAVA_HOME}/jre/"
fi
export JSSE_HOME

case "$1" in
  start)
	if [ -z "$JAVA_HOME" ]; then
		log_failure_msg "no JDK found - please set JAVA_HOME"
		exit 1
	fi

	if [ ! -d "$CATALINA_BASE/conf" ]; then
		log_failure_msg "invalid CATALINA_BASE specified"
		exit 1
	fi

	log_daemon_msg "Starting $DESC" "$NAME"
	if start-stop-daemon --test --start --pidfile "$CATALINA_PID" \
		--user $TOMCAT5_USER --startas "$JAVA_HOME/bin/java" \
		>/dev/null; then

		# Clean up and set permissions on required files
		rm -rf "$CATALINA_BASE"/temp/*
		chown --dereference "$TOMCAT5_USER" "$CATALINA_BASE/conf" \
			"$CATALINA_BASE/conf/tomcat-users.xml" \
			"$CATALINA_BASE/logs" "$CATALINA_BASE/temp" \
			"$CATALINA_BASE/webapps" "$CATALINA_BASE/work" \
			"$CATALINA_BASE/logs/catalina.out" || true

		$DAEMON -user "$TOMCAT5_USER" -cp "$JSVC_CLASSPATH" \
		    -outfile "$LOGFILE"  -errfile '&1' \
		    -pidfile "$CATALINA_PID" $JAVA_OPTS "$BOOTSTRAP_CLASS"
	else
	        log_progress_msg "(already running)"
	fi
	log_end_msg 0
	;;
  stop)
	log_daemon_msg "Stopping $DESC" "$NAME"
        if start-stop-daemon --test --start --pidfile "$CATALINA_PID" \
		--user "$TOMCAT5_USER" --startas "$JAVA_HOME/bin/java" \
		>/dev/null; then
		log_progress_msg "(not running)"
	else
		$DAEMON -cp "$JSVC_CLASSPATH" -pidfile "$CATALINA_PID" \
		     -stop "$BOOTSTRAP_CLASS"
	fi
	log_end_msg 0
	;;
   status)
        if start-stop-daemon --test --start --pidfile "$CATALINA_PID" \
		--user $TOMCAT5_USER --startas "$JAVA_HOME/bin/java" \
		>/dev/null; then

		if [ -f "$CATALINA_PID" ]; then
		    log_success_msg "$DESC is not running, but pid file exists."
		    exit 1
		else
		    log_success_msg "$DESC is not running."
		    exit 3
		fi
	else
		log_success_msg "$DESC is running with pid `cat $CATALINA_PID`"
		exit 0
	fi
        ;;
  restart|force-reload)
        if start-stop-daemon --test --stop --pidfile "$CATALINA_PID" \
		--user $TOMCAT5_USER --startas "$JAVA_HOME/bin/java" \
		>/dev/null; then
		$0 stop
		sleep 1
	fi
	$0 start
	;;
  try-restart)
        if start-stop-daemon --test --start --pidfile "$CATALINA_PID" \
		--user $TOMCAT5_USER --startas "$JAVA_HOME/bin/java" \
		>/dev/null; then
		$0 start
	fi
        ;;
  *)
	log_success_msg "Usage: $0 {start|stop|restart|try-restart|force-reload|status}"
	exit 1
	;;
esac

exit 0

I’ll keep editing as I go:

Install LaunchBox

bash$ sudo apt-get install gnome-launch-box
bash$ gconf-editor

Open apps->gnome-launch-box->bindings and set activate to

<Super>l

This allows gnome-launch-box to be activated using the Windows-L shortcut.

Next setup gnome-launch-box to start automatically. Open System->Preferences->Sessions and create a new Startup Program. I use this command line:

/usr/bin/gnome-launch-box -t -n

Install Compiz/Beryl merge latest

In progress.