Installation

Prerequisites

The OGCE2 2.0 download includes everything that you need to install the portal on UNIX/Linux/Mac OS X operating systems except Java. Some maven jars used in the main portal are compiled with Java 1.5 so this version must be used.

OGCE portlets are designed to work with installed instances of Grid software (Globus's GRAM and GridFTP, MyProxy, Condor, SRB, etc) that are not included in the download. You must install these separately or use an existing installation such as the NSF TeraGrid.

Hardware Requirements

The OGCE2 2.0 release is designed to run on 2-3 separate Tomcat servers.

  1. The Portal Server runs in an Apache Tomcat server on port 8080 by default. This server runs the portal and portlets
  2. The GridPort Server runs GridPort's GPIR and CFT services. This server is configured to use port 7070. Versions prior to 2.0.1 use port 9090.
  3. The Sakai Server runs Sakai services on port 10010. It is also configured to run Tomcat with necessary JVM memory settings. Because of Sakai's high memory requirements, we recommend you run Sakai on a separate host computer.

Running the portal and Web services on separate Tomcat servers simplifies Jar conflicts and allows you to distribute the OGCE across many different servers. Hey, it's a Grid and machines are cheap.

Installing OGCE2 Release 2.0

To install the portal, first unpack it: 

[shell-prompt>tar -zxvf ogce2-2.0.tar.gz
The -z option is a feature of the GNU tar, which we recommend using.

Next, edit the grid.installation.properties and project.properties files to match your local settings. 

[shell-prompt>cd ogce2-2.0
[shell-prompt>vi grid.installation.properties
The grid.installation.properties file includes the names of the MyProxy server, Glogus GRAM, and GridFTP servers you want to use. The project.properties file includes build properties. The portal.server.ip is the most important of these and should be set to your portal server's IP address (see below).

Make sure $JAVA_HOME is set. 

[shell-prompt> echo $JAVA_HOME
[shell-promt> export JAVA_HOME=/path/to/java   (if unset)

Finally, run the install script. This may take a few minutes in your first installation, since Maven must download numerous jars. 

[shell-prompt> ./install.sh

Note on cog.properties Settings

The OGCE portlets use the Java CoG 4 to access Grid resources. Your CoGKit property settings are (by default) located in $HOME/.globus/cog.properties. To avoid conflicts between OGCE portal and other CoG application property requirements, it is possible to use a non-default cog.properties location.

Example settings of properties needed by the OGCE portlets are shown below. 

cacert=/home/myacct/.globus/certificates/
ip=123.456.789
The certificates directory includes all of your CA signing policies.

You have two choices for setting these properties properties:

  1. You may create and edit the $HOME/.globus/cog.properties file by hand. This is recommended if you already have a cog.properties file with specific settings from other projects.
  2. You may use the OGCE build to provide a minimum cog.properties file. This file may optionally be located in $CATALINA_HOME/OGCE/.globus/cog.properties. This will allow you to use multiple cog.properties files without conflict.

To use an alternative cog.properties file location, you will need to pass the property setting org.globus.config.file=$CATALINA_HOME/OGCE/cog.properties to Tomcat's JVM. This is normally done through the $JAVA_OPTS environment variable: 

[shell_prompt> export CATALINA_HOME=$HOME/apache-tomcat-5.5.12/
[shell_prompt> export JAVA_OPTS="-Dorg.globus.config.file=$CATALINA_HOME/OGCE/.globus/cog.properties"

Installing Sakai (Optional)

Run the Sakai installation script. Do this on a separate host computer. You may need to copy the ogce2-2.0.tar.gz bundle to this second computer if you are not using NFS mounted files. 

[shell-prompt>./sakai-install.sh

Starting and Stopping Web Servers

Use the convenience scripts portal-tomcat-startup.sh, gp-tomcat-startup.sh, and sakai-tomcat-startup.sh to run the various servers. You can shut everything down with tomcat-shutdown.sh. As described above, we recommend running the Sakai server on a separate host computer.

Other Tips

Be careful when setting system-wide environment variables. The CLASSPATH and CATALINA_HOME variables can cause unusual problems.

Installing Previous Releases

OGCE2 Release 1.0

OGCE 2's 1.0 portlet series is compatible with the OGCE 2.0 portlets but focused on a uPortal container deployment. For installation instructions, click here

OGCE1 Release 1.0

The OGCE1 series is based on Chef 1.0/Jetspeed 1.4, which predates the JSR 168 portlet standard. These portlets do not interoperate with later OGCE releases. We still make this system available but do not provide support for it under most circumstances.