Operating Systems: AIX, HP-UX, Linux, Solaris, Windows

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Creating complete life cycle WebSphere Application Server Community Edition servers and dynamic clusters

You can create WebSphere^® Application Server Community Edition complete life cycle management servers and expression-based dynamic clusters. You can deploy managed applications to those servers and dynamic clusters.

 

Before you begin

• Determine the version of WebSphere Application Server Community Edition that you want to run. For complete life cycle management, use WebSphere Application Server Community Edition Version 2 or later. If you are using WebSphere Application Server Community Edition Version 1 (all releases), then you can only use assisted life cycle management. To configure assisted life cycle servers, see Configure assisted life cycle WebSphere Application Server Community Edition servers.

• Install the WebSphere Application Server Community Edition runtime environment to the nodes on which you want to run servers. You can either use the installation wizard that is included in WebSphere Application Server Community Edition, or you can configure the centralized installation manager to install the runtime environment. See Downloading and installing WebSphere Application Server Community Edition V2.0 or later for more information.

• Federate your nodes into the cell. See Federating middleware nodes for more information.

 

Procedure

1. Configure the middleware descriptors so that you can run discovery to find the WebSphere Application Server Community Edition runtime environment. If you use the centralized installation manager to install WebSphere Application Server Community Edition, you can skip this step. In the administrative console, click System administration > Middleware descriptors > wasceRuntime. The discovery service uses middleware descriptors to define where to look for the runtime environment. Verify that the middleware descriptors contain the correct installation locations for your environment. Use a semicolon delimiter for Windows^® paths, and a colon delimiter for UNIX^® paths. The following default values exist:

   • C:\Program Files\IBM\WebSphere\AppServerCommunityEdition

   • /opt/IBM/WebSphere/AppServerCommunityEdition

2. Run discovery to find the WebSphere Application Server Community Edition runtimes on the nodes to host servers. If you use the centralized installation manager to install WebSphere Application Server Community Edition, you can skip this step. Discovery runs automatically when the middleware agent starts. Discovery also runs at a predefined time interval that you can specify in the middleware descriptor. However, you can also invoke discovery with the following steps:

   1. In the administrative console, click System administration > Middleware nodes.

   2. Select the nodes to run through discovery, and select the Run discovery operational action.

   3. Click Run.

   4. Verify that the discovery service found the runtime environment. In the administrative console, click System administration > Middleware nodes > node_name > Node Installation Properties. If any runtime environments exist, then properties that begin with WASCE strings are displayed.
   Only the default installation location is listed in the wasceRuntime middleware descriptor. You can modify the middleware descriptor so that the discovery looks for the correct installation location.

3. Create WebSphere Application Server Community Edition deployment targets. The deployment target is where you deploy the WebSphere Application Server Community Edition application. You can create individual WebSphere Application Server Community Edition servers or dynamic clusters.

   • Create a WebSphere Application Server Community Edition server.

     1. In the administrative console, click Servers > Add a server. Choose Create a new server instance, and select the WebSphere Application Server Community Edition server type. You can also click Servers > Other middleware servers > WebSphere Application Server Community Edition servers > New.

     2. Select the node on which you want the WebSphere Application Server Community Edition server to run. This node must have the WebSphere Application Server Community Edition runtime.

     3. Choose the WebSphere Application Server Community Edition server template.

     4. Confirm and save the WebSphere Application Server Community Edition server.

   • Create a WebSphere Application Server Community Edition dynamic cluster.

     1. In the administrative console, click Servers > Dynamic clusters > New.

     2. Choose the WebSphere Application Server Community Edition server dynamic cluster type, and name the dynamic cluster.

     3. To create a dynamic cluster with complete life cycle management, choose Automatically define cluster members with rules. Define a membership policy to identify which nodes host the WebSphere Application Server Community Edition servers in the dynamic cluster. These nodes must have the WebSphere Application Server Community Edition runtime environment installed. The default membership policy follows:

        node_property$IS_WASCE_DISCOVERED = 'TRUE'
        

        This membership policy looks for WebSphere Application Server Community Edition Version 2.0 and later runtimes. If you want to specify a specific version, you might use the following membership policy:

        node_property$WASCE_2.0.0 IS NOT NULL
        

        This policy defines membership as all nodes that run WebSphere Application Server Community Edition Version 2.0.0. The group of nodes that you define must have the exact same version of WebSphere Application Server Community Edition installed. For example, you cannot combine V1 and 2 servers in the same dynamic cluster.

     4. Select the server template for the WebSphere Application Server Community Edition runtime environment that you are using.

     5. Specify other dynamic cluster properties.

     6. Save your WebSphere Application Server Community Edition dynamic cluster.

 

Results

The new server displays in the list on the Servers > Other middleware servers > WebSphere Application Server Community Edition servers administrative console page. If you see an error status icon (), the creation process did not complete. This error can occur because of problems in the WebSphere Application Server Community Edition server runtime environment. Delete the server and try creating the server again.

The list of servers that displays on this administrative console page includes all of your complete life cycle, assisted life cycle, and discovered WebSphere Application Server Community Edition servers. If you have WebSphere Application Server Community Edition dynamic clusters defined, the cluster members are also listed on this administrative console page.

 

What to do next

• Deploy applications to your WebSphere Application Server Community Edition servers and dynamic clusters. See Deploying WebSphere Application Server Community Edition applications for more information.

• Stop discovery from examining the installation location that you used to create your managed servers.

  • If you used discovery to find the WebSphere Application Server Community Edition runtime environment, you can disable discovery globally or you can remove the specific installation location from the middleware descriptor.

  • If you installed the WebSphere Application Server Community Edition runtime environment with the centralized installation manager, discovery was not needed to register the configuration. Do not include centralized installation manager paths in the discovery paths in the middleware descriptor. If you used the default centralized installation manager installation location, globally disable discovery or change the default discovery location to a different path.
  See Configure middleware descriptors for more information.

• Avoid trouble: Do not use the WebSphere Application Server Community Edition console to edit your complete life cycle servers, except for functions that WebSphere Virtual Enterprise does not support. Using the WebSphere Application Server Community Edition console can cause unexpected results. For example, if you edit the server port numbers in the WebSphere Application Server Community Edition console, the port value that is configured for WebSphere Virtual Enterprise is overridden with the new value. gotcha

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Subtopics

WebSphere Application Server Community Edition servers

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Federating middleware nodes

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Deploying WebSphere Application Server Community Edition applications

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Creating middleware server templates

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Configure middleware descriptors

 

Related concepts

Middleware nodes and servers

 

Related tasks

Creating dynamic clusters
Configure assisted life cycle WebSphere Application Server Community Edition servers Adding middleware servers to configurations

 

Related reference

Middleware server creation administrative tasks
Middleware server management administrative tasks