solr/home in web.xml relative to web server home

[Chantal Ackermann <ch...@btelligent.de>]

Hi all,

the environment variable (env-entry) in web.xml to configure the 
solr/home is relative to the web server's working directory. I find this 
unusual as all the servlet paths are relative to the web applications 
directory (webapp context, that is). So, I specified solr/home relative 
to the web app dir, as well, at first.

I think it makes deployment in an unknown environment, or in different 
environments using a simple war more complex than it needed to be. If a 
webapp relative path inside the war file could be used, the 
configuration of solr (and cores) could be included in the war file 
completely with no outside dependency - except, of course, of the data 
directory if that is to go some place else.
(In my case, I want to deliver the solr web application including a 
custom entity processor, so that is why I want to include the solr war 
as part of my release cycle. It is easier to deliver that to the system 
administration than to provide them with partial packages they have to 
install into an already installed war, imho.)

Am I the only one who has run into that?

Thanks for any input on that!
Chantal



-- 
Chantal Ackermann

Re: solr/home in web.xml relative to web server home

[Chris Hostetter <ho...@fucit.org>]

: the environment variable (env-entry) in web.xml to configure the solr/home is
: relative to the web server's working directory. I find this unusual as all the
: servlet paths are relative to the web applications directory (webapp context,
: that is). So, I specified solr/home relative to the web app dir, as well, at
: first.

the intention is not that the SOlr Home dir be configured inside the 
web.xml -- it is *possible* to specify the solr home dir in the web.xml as 
you describe, but that's relaly just a fallback for people who really, 
really, want to bake all of the information into the war.  

solr.war is an application -- when you run hte paplication you specify (at 
run time) some configuration information.  Hardcoding that config 
information into the war file is akin to compile a C++ program with all of 
hte config options hardcoded -- you can do it, but it's not very generic, 
and requires a lot of hacking whenever you want to upgrade.

: (In my case, I want to deliver the solr web application including a custom
: entity processor, so that is why I want to include the solr war as part of my
: release cycle. It is easier to deliver that to the system administration than
: to provide them with partial packages they have to install into an already
: installed war, imho.)

you don't have to "install into an already installed war" to add custom 
plugins .. you just have to put the jar file for your custom plugins into 
a "lib" directory instead of your solr home dir.

This is really no different then something like the Apache HTTPD server. 
there is the application (the binary httpd / solr.war) there is your 
configuration (httpd.conf / solr home dir) and there are custom modules 
you can choose to load (libmod_entityprocessor.so / 
your-entityprocessor.jar)



-Hoss

Re: solr/home in web.xml relative to web server home

[Shalin Shekhar Mangar <sh...@gmail.com>]

On Wed, Jul 29, 2009 at 2:42 PM, Chantal Ackermann <
chantal.ackermann@btelligent.de> wrote:

> Hi all,
>
> the environment variable (env-entry) in web.xml to configure the solr/home
> is relative to the web server's working directory. I find this unusual as
> all the servlet paths are relative to the web applications directory (webapp
> context, that is). So, I specified solr/home relative to the web app dir, as
> well, at first.
>
> I think it makes deployment in an unknown environment, or in different
> environments using a simple war more complex than it needed to be. If a
> webapp relative path inside the war file could be used, the configuration of
> solr (and cores) could be included in the war file completely with no
> outside dependency - except, of course, of the data directory if that is to
> go some place else.
> (In my case, I want to deliver the solr web application including a custom
> entity processor, so that is why I want to include the solr war as part of
> my release cycle. It is easier to deliver that to the system administration
> than to provide them with partial packages they have to install into an
> already installed war, imho.)
>

You don't need to create a custom war for that. You can package the
EntityProcessor into a separate jar and add it to solr_home/lib directory.

-- 
Regards,
Shalin Shekhar Mangar.