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Anonymous12345
Asked: 2010-01-26 07:46:18 +0800 CST

What is a Servlet Container and how to install one?

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I am about to order a VPS (virtual private server) from a provider, and I guess I have to install some Servlet Container right?

I am about to use SOLR and my website is PHP MYSQL JAVASCRIPT based.

How does an installation of a servlet container work? .exe file?

I am VERY new to servlet containers, so please explain in detail...

Also, how do I know which servlet container I should use?

The VPS OS I will be using is Linux.

Thanks

PS: don't know if this belongs on ServerFault

java linux solr servlets

4 Answers

  1. Best Answer

    A servlet container is basically an concrete implementation of the abstract Servlet API. They are available from several makes: Oracle Glassfish, Apache Tomcat, Eclipse Jetty, JBoss AS, etcetera.

    A servlet container is normally already programmed in pure java. Thus, basically all you need to do is to have a JRE (sometimes JDK is required instead) already installed. As for any Java software you can basically just download a ZIP from it, it'll contain the servlet container and several startup/shutdown scripts. Or if you're tied to Windows and/or want to install it as a service, some are also available as an EXE. Check the Downloads section of the beforelinked server makes in question.

    Which one to choose depends on the functional requirement, but I think Apache Tomcat is more than sufficient for your particular purposes. Both Sun Glassfish and JBoss AS are as being full fledged Java EE API implementations much more than "just" a servlet container.

    Tomcat has a quite good "Getting started" documentation: http://tomcat.apache.org/tomcat-7.0-doc/index.html

    Hope this helps.

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  2. Solr is distributed with Jetty. No installation is required unless you specifically want to run a different container.

    You can start Solr within Jetty by cding to $SOLR_HOME/example (where $SOLR_HOME is the root of your Solr install) and running java -jar start.jar. This will bring up Solr on port 8983.

    You can then test by viewing http://your.machine.name:8983/solr (use localhost if the browser is running on the same machine).

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  3. I guess I have to install some Servlet Container right? I am about to use SOLR

    Since SOLR requires one, yes, if you don't have one installed already.

    How does an installation of a servlet container work? .exe file?

    On Windows, that is one way. I believe msi files are preferred for that sort of thing.

    The VPS OS I will be using is Linux.

    Than an exe isn't going to do you much good, since it is the MS DOS / MS Windows executable format. Wikipedia has a list of servlet containers. You need to find one compatible with your OS and read its instructions.

    Better yet, since your current knowledge of the subject seems quite low, hire a system administrator with some experience of the platform to help you get started.

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  4. You can use apache tomcat. It is easy-to-use and reliable. It's one of the mostly used ones. You can get it from here. It has a very well documentation.

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