Appboard/2.4/admin/windows installation

This section provides instructions for installing AppBoard on a Windows Server. It also details how to create a service that will automatically start AppBoard when the server is booted.

Prerequisites

1. Install Java (refer to the System Requirements for supported versions)
2. Ensure JAVA_HOME system environment variable is configured
   1. Start | Right-click on Computer and "Properties" | Advanced System Settings | Environment Variables
   2. Under "System Variables", if there is no "JAVA_HOME" variable set, click "New"
   3. Set "Variable Name" to JAVA_HOME
   4. Set "Variable Path" to the path to Java install path
   5. For example: JAVA_HOME = C:\Program Files\Java\jre7
   6. Note: Make sure JAVA_HOME does not end with "\" and is not surrounded by quotes. It is also recommended that JAVA_HOME not contain spaces.

Installation Tasks

To install AppBoard, perform the following steps on the server:

1. Extract the turnkey installation file to any desired location on the server
2. Save the license file into [INSTALL_HOME]\webapps\enportal\WEB-INF\config\license.properties
3. [optional] Ensure the default ports enPortal use are free or make changes to the listening ports, along with changes to other runtime options. Refer to the Runtime Options page for further information.
4. [optional] AppBoard comes with a pre-configured H2 database for storing configuration. An external configuration database can also be used, see the Configuration Database page for more information.
5. Run the Tomcat startup executable in [INSTALL_HOME]\bin\startup.bat
6. Validate the installation
   1. Go to the following URL in a supported web browser on any workstation that has network access to the AppBoard server: http://localhost:8080
   2. When prompted, log in with the following default credentials (case sensitive):
      1. User Name: administrator
      2. Password: administrator
      3. Domain: System

32-bit Systems

By default the turnkey installation is configured with 64-bit executables. For 32-bit systems the following additional tasks must be performed:

1. Navigate to [INSTALL_HOME]\server\bin\windows-x86 and copy the 32-bit Tomcat files from the \windows-x86 folder up one level to replace the default 64-bit versions in the \bin folder:
   1. tcnative-1.dll
   2. tomcat7.exe
2. It may be necessary to reduce the memory usage, refer to next step and the Memory Configuration page.

Create an AppBoard Service

After installing AppBoard, you can configure the application for automated startup. For example, on a production server, you may want the application to start up automatically any time the server is re-started. This can be implemented using a Windows service. This section details how to configure automated startup.

• It is required that you are the administrator when opening a console to install a service.
• A 64-bit JVM must be used when running as a service on 64-bit Windows.
• See sub-section if using a JRE vs JDK

The following steps detail how to create a Windows service for automated startup:

1. Open a Command Prompt as the administrator (right-click and Run as administrator).
2. Navigate to [INSTALL_HOME]\server\bin
3. Enter the following command to install the Windows service:

   > service install

4. If successful, the message should be displayed: "The service 'EdgeTomcat' has been installed."
5. Enter the following command later if you need to remove the Windows service:

   > service remove

6. If successful, the message should be displayed: "The service 'EdgeTomcat' has been removed."

The service is installed with manual startup configured. The Startup type is changed by running "services.msc" from Windows, selecting properties for "Edge Tomcat", then choosing the desired startup type, such as "Automatic".

The command > tomcat7w.exe //MS//EdgeTomcat can be used to monitor the service and access the service configuration. Launching this utility will add an Edge Tomcat icon in the system tray. Right-click the icon to start/stop or further configure the service.

Installing Service using JRE

The service.bat script is sensitive to whether using a Java Runtime Environment (JRE) versus a full Java Development Kit (JDK).

When using a JRE it is necessary to temporarily change the JAVA_HOME environment variable to JRE_HOME. After successful installation or removal of the service then change the environment variable back to JAVA_HOME.

Stopping AppBoard

To stop AppBoard, terminate the Tomcat process that is running on the AppBoard server.

When AppBoard is stopped, all current Users who are logged in to the system will receive an error message the next time they make a request to the AppBoard server. Subsequent Users will not be able to access the login page until AppBoard is re-started. If you are stopping a production instance of AppBoard, it is recommended that you schedule a maintenance window and send advance notification to Users of the system. You can check if there are any active Users logged in to AppBoard before stopping it, by using the Session Manager.

There are several ways to terminate the Tomcat process:

• Execute the shutdown script that is provided:

  [INSTALL_HOME]/server/bin/shutdown.bat

• If running as a service, stop the Edge Tomcat service
• In the console, enter CTRL-C

You must properly shut down Tomcat. Do not kill the process by clicking the window "close" button ("X") or by using the Unix kill command (kill -9 <processid>). If the database does not properly shut down, residual lock files have been documented to cause problems when restoring archives.