Deployment with Symbolic Links

["Robert D. Abernethy IV" <ro...@hotmail.com>]

I'm looking for some kind of "best practice" guidelines.  Here's the
situation.  I'm developing a web application locally and deploying it to
a remote server using ant.  I am currently packaging up the web app into
a WAR file and using the tomcat manager ant tasks to install the web app
from the WAR file.  When I wish to reload the web app, I am removing it
and then reinstalling it.  Additionally, the web app would like to have
access to an image directory hosted by apache on the same server.  I
have managed this by creating a symbolic link in the web app's directory
that points to the image directory.  The problem occurs when I reload
the web app - the symbolic link is removed.  So, here are my questions:

Is using a WAR file the best way to deploy a web app to a remote server?

Is there a better way to reload the web app other than to remove and
reinstall it?

Is there a better way to grant the web app access to the image directory
other than the symbolic link?

Thus far, I have gotten around the problem by using the exec task to
execute a command via SSH.  The command rebuilds the symbolic link after
the WAR file has been unpacked and installed.  I have found, however,
that Tomcat does not recognize the link until it has been restarted.


Rob Abernethy
Dynamic Edge, Inc.

---------------------------------------------------------------------
To unsubscribe, e-mail: tomcat-user-unsubscribe@jakarta.apache.org
For additional commands, e-mail: tomcat-user-help@jakarta.apache.org