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This guide covers downloading and installing Tomcat 8 on an Ubuntu Linux 9 on a linux server.

Prerequisites

You have installed Ubuntu 16 Linux.

You can The following instructions assume that:

  • you can login as a non-root user with sudo access.

...

  • you have installed Java, with the required settings.

Instructions

Step 1  Create Tomcat user

...

Warning

Do not run Tomcat as root as this constitutes a security risk.

This is the tomcat user (in the tomcat group).

...

Code Block
sudo groupadd tomcat
sudo useradd -s /bin/false -g tomcat -d /opt/tomcat tomcat

Step 2  Download and

...

install Tomcat 

Excerpt

  1. Download

    1. To find the latest version

...

    1. , go to the

...

    1. Tomcat downloads page: https://tomcat.apache.org/download-90.cgi
    2. Find the latest Binary Distributions section, then the Core sub-heading, and copy the tar.gz link.

Download Tomcat

...

    1. To download Tomcat, on the Linux server, go to the tmp directory

...

    1. . Use the curl command to download from

...

    1. the the tar.gz link.

      Code Block
      cd /tmp
curl -O
http
    1. https://
mirror.ox.ac.uk/sites/rsync.
    1. downloads.apache.org/tomcat/tomcat-
8
    1. 9/
v8
    1. v9.
5
    1. 0.
11
    1. 97/bin/apache-tomcat-
8
    1. 9.
5
    1. 0.
11
    1. 97.tar.gz


  2. Install

...

    1. Unpack the

...

    1. Tomcat tar.gz file

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    1. into /opt/tomcat

...

    1. .

      Code Block
      sudo mkdir /opt/tomcat
cd /opt/tomcat
sudo tar xvf /tmp/apache-tomcat-
8
    1. 9*tar.gz --strip-components=1

Configure tomcat

...


    1. This creates the tomcat folders (conf, logs, webapps etc.) directly under /opt/tomcat.

    2. Set the file ownership and permissions.

      Code Block
      cd /opt
sudo chown -R tomcat:tomcat tomcat
cd tomcat
sudo chmod -R g+r conf
sudo chmod g+x conf


Step 3  Create a service wrapper

This step creates a wrapper that allows Tomcat to be managed as a service. Using a service means you can stop and start Tomcat reliably, and ensures that the running environment (e.g. the starting directory) is well defined.

These instructions create a systemd service.

First, create a service definition file:

Code Block
sudo vi /etc/systemd/system/tomcat.service

And then paste the following script into the file, making sure that the script is adjusted so that: 

  • JAVA_HOME is the base installation of Java. If you don't know where this is, run the command:
Code Block
update-alternatives --list java

This will give you the full path of the java program, for example: /usr/lib/jvm/temurin-11-jdk-amd64/bin/java. The installation directory in this case is /usr/lib/jvm/temurin-11-jdk-amd64.

  • The memory settings (-Xms and -Xmx) on the line for CATALINA_OPTS are set as needed (this example assumes you are allocating 8GB of memory to tomcat); see Tomcat Planning for details of estimating Tomcat's memory allocation
  • The location of the GC (Garbage Collection) log file, set in CATALINA_OPTS, is correct - in the examples below, this /opt/tomcat/logs

Java 8

Code Block
[Unit]
Description=Apache Tomcat Web Application Container
After=network.target

[Service]
Type=forking

Environment=JAVA_HOME=/usr/lib/jvm/temurin-8-jdk-amd64
Environment=CATALINA_PID=/opt/tomcat/temp/tomcat.pid
Environment=CATALINA_HOME=/opt/tomcat
Environment=CATALINA_BASE=/opt/tomcat
Environment='CATALINA_OPTS=-Xms8096M -Xmx8096M -server -XX:+PrintGCDetails -XX:+PrintGCDateStamps -Xloggc:/opt/tomcat/logs/gc-%%t.log'
Environment='JAVA_OPTS=-Djava.awt.headless=true'

ExecStart=/opt/tomcat/bin/startup.sh
ExecStop=/opt/tomcat/bin/shutdown.sh

WorkingDirectory=/opt/tomcat

User=tomcat
Group=tomcat
UMask=0007
RestartSec=10
Restart=always

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

Java 11

Code Block
[Unit]
Description=Apache Tomcat Web Application Container
After=network.target

[Service]
Type=forking

Environment=JAVA_HOME=/usr/lib/jvm/temurin-11-jdk-amd64
Environment=CATALINA_PID=/opt/tomcat/temp/tomcat.pid
Environment=CATALINA_HOME=/opt/tomcat
Environment=CATALINA_BASE=/opt/tomcat
Environment='CATALINA_OPTS=-Xms8096M -Xmx8096M -server -Xlog:gc=debug:file=/opt/tomcat/logs/gc-%%t.log:time,uptimemillis,tid'
Environment='JAVA_OPTS=-Djava.awt.headless=true'

ExecStart=/opt/tomcat/bin/startup.sh
ExecStop=/opt/tomcat/bin/shutdown.sh

WorkingDirectory=/opt/tomcat

User=tomcat
Group=tomcat
UMask=0007
RestartSec=10
Restart=always

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

Now enable, then start the service:

Code Block
sudo systemctl daemon-reload
sudo systemctl start tomcat

Lastly, check that the service started:

Code Block
sudo systemctl status tomcat

Conclusion

From this point on, tomcat will start automatically when the host restarts, and you can re-start tomcat manually like this:

Code Block
sudo systemctl restart tomcat