links for 2009-06-24

June 24, 2009 Posted in: Social Networking
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links for 2009-06-19

June 19, 2009 Posted in: Social Networking
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links for 2009-06-16

June 16, 2009 Posted in: Social Networking
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Twitter Recap for Week Ending 2009-06-15

June 14, 2009 Posted in: Social Networking
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Facebook Vanity Land Grab – Behind The Scenes

June 14, 2009 Posted in: Personal Branding, Social Networking

Last night, we were live at Facebook headquarters when they launched Facebook (Facebook) usernames to the public. The numbers were astounding, and so was the celebration over the successful launch.

http://mashable.com/2009/06/13/facebook-3-million-usernames/

Great article from Ben Parr at Mashable, showing what went on at Facebook HQ during Friday night’s vanity land grab.

What I took away from the photos that were posted, was that Facebook’s success is based on the following criteria:

  • All having Pros with large external monitors
  • A casual dress code
  • All able to work in the same room to facilitate collaboration
  • Close proximity of Beach Boy-esque musical equipment to release tension
  • An ample supple of Blue Moon Hefeweizen, Newcastle Brown Ale and McCallan 12 year old scotch

I grabbed my piece of the Facebook landscape:
http://www.facebook.com/craigsdickson

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JavaOne 2009 – (Mostly) Important Questions (Mostly) Answered

June 11, 2009 Posted in: Software Development, Training

A few days before JavaOne I posted some questions that I was looking forward to finding out the answers too. Here is what I found out.

Has Hudson Killed CruiseControl?
I saw a couple of presentations on Hudson. I also saw Kohsuke Kawaguchi at the Thirsty Bear and he was drinking the good , so clearly Hudson is verging on world domination under his guidance.

I never saw Cruisecontrol mentioned anywhere. Not in the conference catalog and not in the pavilion.

I am now even more convinced that Hudson is the way forward for open source Java Continuous Integration.

What Will Be The Volume Of The Noise Coming From Inside The Conference?
There was definitely a strong stream of Tweets around the #javaone keyword all week. I was able to get a different perspective during the General Sessions by watching the stream go by as people Tweeted about what was being said on stage.

But what I will say is that I was able to keep up with the volume of Tweets. I mention this because I started to try and follow the #wwdc keyword this week as the Apple conference was going on and I simply could not keep up, not even close. Every time my TweetDeck was refreshing, I was getting more than 100 Tweets during the opening keynote. I gave up in the end and turned the live search off.

Also, while I saw some people Tweet about “is there a Tweetup?“, I never actually saw anyone take the bold step to be the organizer of one.

So definitely more Twittering going on, but nothing earth shattering. I was also hoping to see a vendor try and use as a medium for some kind of viral promotion during the conference, but I didn’t see anything that creative unfortunately.

Will AJAX Presentations Be THE Place To Be Seen For A 3rd Year Running?
So there were definitely a lot of AJAX based presentations. There were also a lot of REST presentations, which (at least in my experience) seem to always stray over into the AJAX world.

But there were also probably an equal number of presentations. Although I would take the amount of presentations and other buzz with a grain of salt as it is Sun’s pet project and it was their conference.

There was even an AJAX vs presentation to round things out on that front.

But I do think my prediction of all topics related to the cloud as being the hot topics of the conference was probably correct – probably only outnumbered by speculation related to the whole Sun/Oracle situation. There was a track on the Monday morning related to the cloud, there was an unconference on the Monday afternoon called “Cloud Camp”, Sun showed off cloud related provisioning in the Tuesday morning keynote and there were a whole pile of regular sessions either related to new cloud topics, or just repositioning old topics to add the buzzword cloud to their repertoire.

What Will The Oracle Presence Be?
So a bit of a mixed bag on this front.

As most people who care already know, Larry Ellison made an appearance at the keynote on Tuesday morning. I was actually rooting for him to not show up at all – I think that would have been the best play for Oracle. I think McNealy played it well, but it was obvious that both men were a little uncomfortable and they stumbled on some awkward topics during the time they shared the stage. I don’t actually think Larry really cleared any of the FUD related to the situation even though he tried to reassure people that Oracle “likes” Java.

Beyond Larry’s appearance though, Oracle’s presence was actually less than previous years. Most notably, Oracle had absolutely zero presence in the pavilion this year. You can speculate to heart’s content as to why that was. I believe there was at least one session from Oracle personnel, but I did not make it to that one.

I didn’t see any Oracle signage around the conference, it pretty much was business as usual from that standpoint.

What Will The Reaction To The Microsoft Keynote Be?
This turned out to be a dud when compared to the chatter leading up to it.

There was little reaction from the crowd, although from my quick eyeballing of the room, it seemed to be the smallest attendance for keynote during the week.

Basically Microsoft told us that integration is import – wow, thanks for that, welcome to the party. The rest of it was a thinly veiled marketing pitch, which never goes over well at a technical conference.

Will Jonathon Schwartz Look As Uncomfortable And Awkward As Usual?
Believe it or not, I actually think Schwartz did a reasonable job on the Tuesday morning. It didn’t feel quite as stiff as usual. His interaction with partners etc. was still a little cumbersome but nothing worse than I have seen elsewhere.

I was super happy to see Scott McNealy make an appearance – it was clearly the highlight of the keynote. I also think Sun made the right call to have McNealy be the one to address the elephant in the room. The standing ovation he received when he left the stage I think was evidence of that and was also the highpoint of the whole keynote.

Will James Gosling’s Toy Show Seem Overly Long And Desperate Again?
The toy show was the same old story as expected. I sat through it and there are some interesting niche type Java things going on, but I still left the session with overwhelming sense of “meh”.

I think the most interesting part of the Friday morning keynote was the fact that there was absolutely no acknowledgment of the Oracle/Sun situation at all, nor was there any acknowledgment that this was probably the end of JavaOne, at least as we know it today. I had predicted the Friday morning keynote to be somewhat emotional with a bunch of farewells and look-backs, but as it turns out, the Tuesday morning keynote was the one that had the emotion in it.

Will The Lunch Lines Be Under Control?
Nope, lunch lines were ridiculous as usual.

I am always impressed at how megalomaniacal the event staff get at Moscone during these big conferences.

Will It Be Crazy Cold in Yerba Buena Gardens on Thursday Night Again?
I was way off on this one.

The weather was forecast to be horrible on Thursday and so the event staff moved the party to the ballroom at the Marriott on 4th street. As it turns out it was perfectly dry on Thursday and it could have easily been held outside, but it was certainly cold.

The party was actually pretty good and the band was excellent for the setting IMHO and the food was significantly better than last year’s corn dogs and popcorn.

Will The Bookstore Be Given More Space?
Nope, exactly the same space, exactly the same pushy-shovey experience trying to browse the books.

Will Enough People Use me As A Reference So I Can Get The Better Swag?
Unfortunately no. :(

Why are the A’s and Giants both playing away all week?
The MLB has declined to comment on this obvious conspiracy.

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Twitter Recap for Week Ending 2009-06-08

June 7, 2009 Posted in: Social Networking
  • Bad sign for attendence @ #javaone. Keynote hall set up much smaller than previous years, definitely fewer seats #
  • Sitting in #communityone keynote session #
  • Wondering if physical disaster recover sites should now be replaced with cloud services #
  • First technical session of the week – Taking Advantage Of Subversion’s New Features #
  • Family Blog Update: insert witty fork pun here… http://bit.ly/b28K3 #
  • 2nd session of the day “Test Your Product On Multiple Machines in Parallel with Hudson” #communityone #
  • @chungsean welcome to #javaone sir #
  • Sitting in “Community Equity: Social Value System for Social Network” #communityone #
  • Just arrived @ pavillion reception for #communityone #
  • @alicia_s is it really small? Stupid fat hobbit #
  • Following semi-naked marching band to next party @ #communityone #
  • @alicia_s we’re talking about whatever you want to talk about #
  • Frankie says relax at #communityone party #
  • @srabon having an OK time. I am carrying some flu symptoms, so taking it easy to make sure I last the whole week. in reply to srabon #
  • Need one more person to use me as a refererence for #javaone registration to get the Flip. Earn yourself some good karma points – W1302019 #
  • In #javaone opening keynote, waiting for it to start, same DJ as last year #
  • Grey foggy morning in SF, will only get worse if Ellison shows up at the #javaone keynote #
  • Some McNealy and no Elison so far. Oh and I caught on on t-shirt. Good so far, #javaone #
  • I spoke too soon, Elison on stage now. ;( #javaone #
  • Elison was doing ok until he dissed AJAX – wrong room for that statement. #javaone #
  • In 2nd tech session of the day already at #javaone. This one on Amazon EC2. Also saw the one on OpenESB and BPEL. #
  • Is #OpenSolaris the product with the most swag and the least number of users at #javaone? Seriously, I do not get it. #
  • Watching JBoss mini-talk on there new ESB in the pavillion #
  • Thanks to @abridgwater for inviting me to the Press/Analyst Reception tonight. Cheers mate. #javaone #
  • Heading to the Java Community Process party at the Intercontinental for more #javaone fun #
  • Family Blog Update: cute of the day… http://bit.ly/PxdvC #
  • Mashed Potato Martinis at the JCP party! #javaone #
  • In a lab at #javaone about building social apps. using Zembly – same tool that @briankous demoed to the Behr team last Friday. #
  • In Joshua Bloch’s Effective Java talk for about the 5th year straight. #javaone #
  • In HtmlUnit session w/ @briankous at #javaone #
  • @briankous the jboss party is tomorrow night @ jillian’s, not tonight. how about a team dinner instead? in reply to briankous #
  • Netflix just sent me Weeds: Season 4: Disc 1 #
  • team dinner @ Magnolia, 1398 Haight St (Haight @ Masonic) 7:45pm – meet in lobby of my hotel 7:30pm to share taxi, or see you there #
  • Having dinner w/ @briankous @chungsean @michaelpallas and @tshumaker @godfather #
  • BTW, what kind of douche uses @godfather as their handle? Freakin’ Vito #
  • Sitting in a restaurant on Haight St in San Francisco and they are playing The Grateful Dead – is that just gratuitous? #
  • #JavaOne After Dark moved to the Marriott (4th & MIssion) because of probable bad weather tomorrow (actually later today really) #
  • RT @ABridgwater: Adrian on ZDNet.co.uk “The view from the floor at #JavaOne” http://bit.ly/3gb6d #
  • Urgh, the OpenSSO lab I am in is full of problems. #javaone #
  • FYI, if your English is not so good, strapping on a mic. and yelling and speaking really fast is not going to help the situation. #javaone #
  • #JBoss Party is starting. Free and a front row seat to watch the Lakers on a 20ft screen. I love Java. #javaone #
  • Damn, @briankous just broke a glass. Half a and we are going to have to cut him off already. #javaone the corruptor of innocents #
  • @gorkeyv are you high? #
  • @chungsean and I have moved on to the After Dark Party @ the Marriott #
  • I am watching the original lead singer of Toto sing Africa. i think I have slipped into a totally awesome alternate dimension @ #javaone #
  • @gorkeyv since when do you get so sticky over the Lakers? #
  • If there is any actual original member of Skynyrd on stage, is it OK to scream for Free Bird? #
  • I just saw any original member of Skynyrd play a 10:30 version of Free Bird – all bets are off for the rest of the night. Fuck yeah! #
  • Last keynote at possibly the last #JavaOne has just started – probably a few teary eyes in the room by the end I expect #
  • Today’s #javaone keynote, no emotion expressed, no acknowledgment of the end of JavaOne in this form, and also no “see you next year”. #
  • 2nd to last #javaone session about to start. Hopefully Mr Galbraith will be as interesting as usual and will keep me awake #
  • #javaone we are off to on on good start – Ben just slammed SAP user interface :) #
  • @jazzlifejunkie and if that all goes well, red eyes in the morning #
  • Log: Dogfish Head 90 Minute IPA #
  • #Beer Log: Rogue – St Rogue Dry Hopped Red Ale #
  • @jazzlifejunkie touche sir #
  • #Beer Log: Rogue – Hazelnut Brown #
  • #Beer Log: Rogue – Anniversary Charlie – Dry Hopped American Strong Ale #
  • #Beer Log: Moylan’s – Hopsickle Imperial Ale – Triple IPA #
  • Family Blog Update: He’s coming home today… http://bit.ly/Dnuoo #
  • @gorkeyv thanks for the balanced well thought out reviews. you realize that it is #apple that has cult like followers , not #palm right? in reply to gorkeyv #
  • Maybe that should be the #pre tag line “Guaranteed to be really a lot like an #iIPhone since we used the same people” #
  • Adelaide Crows def. Essendon Bombers, 130 to 114 #
  • Family Blog Update: Back From San Francsico http://bit.ly/bZJhT #
  • Family Blog Update: Birthday Present http://bit.ly/Om85e #
  • Family Blog Update: Certified : Totally Nerdy http://bit.ly/sc7nF #
  • Family Blog Update: Are You Going To San Francisco? http://bit.ly/rAjbc #
  • Family Blog Update: Fog In San Francsico? http://bit.ly/2A6nBL #
  • Forgot my camera cable. Finally able to post my #javaone photos. http://bit.ly/KjZTE #
  • Everyone expects the new #iPhone to be announced tomorrow at WWDC, but will it also be available in stores tomorrow? http://bit.ly/t1U6e #
  • Family Blog Update: Stayin’ In Touch http://bit.ly/gyyGb #
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Tweeting Bar Tweets Every Beer Pour

June 1, 2009 Posted in: Social Networking

… a digital agency in New York, has jimmy rigged their office tap to tweet every time a pour is completed, and even when the keg needs to be replaced.

http://mashable.com/2009/06/01/tweeting-bar/

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JavaOne 2009 – (Mostly) Important Questions

May 28, 2009 Posted in: Software Development, Training

JavaOne 2009 starts in 5 days. Here is a list of questions I am looking forward to finding out the answers too.

Has Hudson Killed CruiseControl?
Seems like it has based on the number of mentions of Hudson vs CruiseControl in relation to the content at JavaOne. I lost my interest in CruiseControl when ThoughtWorks spun a for-profit version out of it. The only company I have seen be successful at this strategy is JBoss/RedHat where they develop the open-source version first and then roll the for-profit version out of that. The other times I have seen this attempted, all of the effort goes into the for-profit version and the open-source version ceases to progress. There is something fundamental about that 2nd pattern that just smells bad and doesn’t really seem to be in the spirit of open-source.

What Will Be The Volume Of The Noise Coming From Inside The Conference?
I have been tracking the hashed keywords related to the conference for a couple of weeks now. The volume has been slowly increasing and took a big jump on Tuesday morning when everyone got back from the long weekend in the US. I expect it to keep building up until Tuesday morning, but then what? Does it slow down because everyone is busy, or does it kick into a whole new gear and my trusty Twitterberry will just meltdown in the middle of the opening keynote?

Also curious to see what ad-hoc social activities get incubated in the Twitterverse during the conference?

Will AJAX Presentations Be THE Place To Be Seen For A 3rd Year Running?
The last 2 years have seen crazy interest in anything AJAX related. With Ben Galbraith and Dion Almer (spelling from there) being the focal point in their always entertaining presentations. But it feels a little like AJAX is getting to be slightly old news, at least in this forum.

My guess is that anything cloud related is going to be the hip place to be seen this year.

What Will The Oracle Presence Be?
AFAIK, the Oracle/Sun deal has not gone through yet, so technically Sun is still an independent entity. But of course I am also not naive enough to think Oracle won’t be pushing to start getting their hands on the “goods” at this conference. Will there be an Oracle presence in the keynotes that are traditionally Sun’s (the 2 on Tuesday and the 1 Friday morning)? What about signage around the conference? Oracle always has a booth in the pavilion, but will it be bigger, better positioned etc. this year?

What Will The Reaction To The Microsoft Keynote Be?
So the Twittervese exploded earlier this week when it was announced Microsoft will be presenting the Thursday morning keynote. Anyone who has been playing with Java long enough knows that Microsoft has not really been Java’s best friend. So, will the Java community accept Microsoft on the main stage? It would be nice to think that there will be some passionate reaction, either outrageous clapping or hateful booing, whatever, as long as there is some definitive reaction I will be happy. I fear the Java faithful might not be the kind to wear their hearts on their sleeves quite that much though.

Does the Oracle deal have something to do with Microsoft’s presence? Why does Oracle not have a keynote instead? Curious indeed.

Will Jonathon Schwartz Look As Uncomfortable And Awkward As Usual?
I will admit upfront that I am a Scott McNealy fan. He was passionate, and engaging to listen to on a stage. I was not happy when he was ousted from the top of Sun.

But even if I temper my anger over that situation, can anyone really be interested in listening to Schwartz talk? His stage presence is awful and he is robotic in his delivery of obviously scripted lines when guests are on stage. And don’t get me started on the pony tail, sport coat and jeans look! Bring back McNealy for the last one please!!!!

Will James Gosling’s Toy Show Seem Overly Long And Desperate Again?
I have a lot to thank James Gosling for. Most of my career is based on the technology he invented. I would like to have a with him at some point no doubt. But man, he is only marginally better than Schwartz on stage.

And I do not really understand the point of the Toy Show in the Friday morning keynote. You are at THE Java conference, and so the audience has self selected itself as resoundingly pro-Java. So why do we need a 3 hour carnival of Java applications trying to prove to us that Java is cool. We already think it is cool, that is why we are there. A lot of it just feels like they are pleading with us to please, please keep thinking Java is cool for another year until the next conference.

Will The Lunch Lines Be Under Control?
Getting your “free” lunch at JavaOne is an exercise in forgoing your basic right to not be hearded like livestock and yelled at by over zealous minimum wage event staff. It is like they are surprised by the number of people that show up for lunch each day, like there was no way they could possibly have guesstimated how many people might want to eat that day. Seriously, it is your last chance to get it right, please make an effort.

Will It Be Crazy Cold in Yerba Buena Gardens on Thursday Night Again?
Why is the Thursday night party outside now? I can’t possibly imagine it is much cheaper is it? It is San Francisco, it is cold on the hottest day of the year. I froze my ass off last year. The long range weather forecast looks like we are in for the same again.

Will The Bookstore Be Given More Space?
Doubt it. There is a whole convention center, and the bookstore gets jammed in a 10 by 30 square. Why? Why do you hate people who like to read?

Will Enough People Use me As A Reference So I Can Get The Better Swag?
I know 3 people who did, I think I need 2 more. I will even buy you a . My number is W1302019. Go ahead and earn yourself some karma points.

Why are the A’s and Giants both playing away all week?
A big boo to the MLB for having both teams out of town this week. It has become somewhat of a tradition for me to take my team to the baseball during JavaOne and you have destroyed that cherished pastime. Shame on you Bud Selig.

See you in San Francisco!

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Installing JBoss Portal

May 22, 2009 Posted in: Software Development, Development Tools, System Administration

Today I finished a successful fresh install of . Below is the process I followed.

Versions

  • — 2.7.2 (bundled with JBoss AS 4.2.3)
  • JavaSE — 5.0 Update 19
  • MySQL — 5.1.34 (Community Edition)
  • Linux Flavor — Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server 5.2 (64 bit)

Step 1 – Downloads

  1. I grabbed the Java installer from here http://java.sun.com/javase/downloads/index_jdk5.jsp. The downloaded file was called jdk-1_5_0_19-linux-amd64-rpm.bin
  2. I grabbed the Portal binaries from here http://www.jboss.org/jbossportal/download/index.html. The downloaded file was called jboss-portal-2.7.2-bundled.zip
  3. I grabbed the MySQL binary from here http://dev.mysql.com/downloads/mysql/5.1.html#linux-rhel5-x86-64bit-rpms. I downloaded the server (MySQL-server-community-5.1.34-0.rhel5.x86_64.rpm) and the client (MySQL-client-community-5.1.34-0.rhel5.x86_64.rpm) RPMs
  4. I grabbed the MySQL JDBC driver from this page http://dev.mysql.com/downloads/connector/j/5.1.html. The downloaded file was called mysql-connector-java-5.1.7.tar.gz

Step 2 – Install JavaSE

  1. I made the installer executable

    $ chmod +x jdk-1_5_0_19-linux-amd64-rpm.bin
  2. Then executed the installer

    $ ./jdk-1_5_0_19-linux-amd64-rpm.bin
  3. I paged through endless legal boilerplate and accepted it by typing yes and hitting enter (hopefully I didn’t sell my soul)
  4. The installer extracted the RPM file and installed it.
    I double checked the package was installed by querying the RPM database:

    $ rpm -q jdk
    jdk-1.5.0_19-fcs
    $

    This RPM installed all of the files into /usr/java/jdk1.5.0_19

  5. I edited the /etc/profile file to make the JAVA_HOME environment variable and Java binaries available to everyone on the box. I added the following lines to achieve this

    export JAVA_HOME=/usr/java/jdk1.5.0_19
    export PATH=$PATH:$JAVA_HOME/bin
  6. I double checked it all worked

    $ source /etc/profile
    $ echo $JAVA_HOME
    /usr/java/jdk1.5.0_19
    $

Step 3 – Deploy Portal Binaries

  1. I am never sure the correct place in a Linux distribution to put 3rd party stuff, but I went with /usr/local this time

    $ pwd
    /usr/local
    $ unzip ~/jboss-portal-2.7.2-bundled.zip

    This created the directory /usr/local/jboss-portal-2.7.2

  2. Once again, I edited the /etc/profile file to add the JBoss environment to it by adding the following line

    export JBOSS_HOME=/usr/local/jboss-portal-2.7.2

    Then I tested it

    $ source /etc/profile
    $ echo $JBOSS_HOME
    /usr/local/jboss-portal-2.7.2
    $

Step 4 – Change Default Port (Optional)
For my install I have no need to run Apache in front of JBoss, so I want JBoss to listen (or more correctly, have Tomcat listen) directly on port 80 – by default it listens on 8080.

  1. I opened the $JBOSS_HOME/server/default/deploy/jboss-web.deployer/server.xml file, (which is a standard Tomcat configuration file) in an editor.
  2. I changed the port of the HTTP connector to 80 (you can find it by searching for 8080). I also change the HTTPS connector to use 443 (you can find this one by searching for 8443). I then changed the value of the redirectPort attribute of the HTTP connector to match.

Step 5 – Change Portal to be the root web app. (Optional)
For my install, the Portal will be the main application on the server, so I want it to be accessible from the root of the server, and not have to enter the portal context path all of the time.

  1. First, I disabled the current root application

    $ mv $JBOSS_HOME/server/default/deploy/jboss-web.deployer/ROOT.war $JBOSS_HOME/server/default/deploy/jboss-web.deployer/ROOT.war.old
  2. I opened the $JBOSS_HOME/server/default/deploy/jboss-portal.sar/portal-server.war/WEB-INF/jboss-web.xml file, in an editor.
  3. I found the <context -root> tag and changed the vallue to be just a single forward slash character.

    <context-root>/</context-root>
  4. I saved the file and exited the editor.

Step 6 – Install MySQL
By default, will use a Hypersonic database for all of its internal data. My environment will be a production environment, so I want to use something more robust.

  1. I Installed the MySQL binaries by using a normal RPM install

    $ rpm -ivh MySQL-server-community-5.1.34-0.rhel5.x86_64.rpm
    $ rpm -ivh MySQL-client-community-5.1.34-0.rhel5.x86_64.rpm

    The installation process started the mysqld service automatically. It also installed MySQL as a service automatically.

  2. I checked that it was running

    $ mysqladmin version
    mysqladmin Ver 8.42 Distrib 5.1.34, for unknown-linux-gnu on x86_64
    Copyright 2000-2008 MySQL AB, 2008 Sun Microsystems, Inc.
    This comes with ABSOLUTELY NO WARRANTY. This is free ,
    and you are welcome to modify and redistribute it under the GPL license

    Server version 5.1.34-community
    Protocol version 10
    Connection Localhost via UNIX socket
    UNIX socket /var/lib/mysql/mysql.sock
    Uptime: 5 hours 29 min 16 sec

    Threads: 1 Questions: 5 Slow queries: 0 Opens: 15 Flush tables: 1 Open tables: 8 Queries per second avg: 0.0
    $

There are a lot of things you might want to do to a base MySQL install before putting it into production, but that is beyond the scope of this document. I would start with this link for some of the things you need to consider: http://dev.mysql.com/doc/refman/5.1/en/unix-post-installation.html

Step 7 – Point the Portal at MySQL

  1. I connected to the MySQL server running on localhost, as the current user (which happened to be root in my case).

    $ mysql
    Welcome to the MySQL monitor. Commands end with ; or g.
    Your MySQL connection id is 15
    Server version: 5.1.34-community MySQL Community Server (GPL)

    Type ‘help;’ or ‘h’ for help. Type ‘c’ to clear the current input statement.

    mysql>

  2. I created a Database instance for the Portal to use

    mysql> CREATE DATABASE jbossportal;
    Query OK, 1 row affected (0.00 sec)
  3. Then I created a user for the Portal to connect as

    mysql> CREATE USER ‘portal’@'localhost’ IDENTIFIED BY ‘portalpassword’;
    Query OK, 0 rows affected (0.00 sec)
  4. Then I granted all privileges for the jbossportal Database to the user I just created

    mysql> GRANT ALL ON jbossportal.* TO ‘portal’@'localhost’;
    Query OK, 0 rows affected (0.00 sec)

    At this point I quit the MySQL interpreter.

  5. Next, I untared the MySQL JDBC driver

    $ tar zxvf mysql-connector-java-5.1.7.tar.gz
  6. Then I copied the driver jar file to the $JBOSS_HOME/server/default/lib/ directory

    $ cp mysql-connector-java-5.1.7/mysql-connector-java-5.1.7-bin.jar $JBOSS_HOME/server/default/lib
  7. Next I disabled the original Hypersonic datasource

    $ mv $JBOSS_HOME/server/default/deploy/portal-hsqldb-ds.xml $JBOSS_HOME/server/default/deploy/portal-hsqldb-ds.xml.bak
  8. Then I deployed a datasource descriptor for MySQL. There is an example datasource descriptor in the binary distribution

    $ cp $JBOSS_HOME/setup/portal-mysql5-ds.xml $JBOSS_HOME/server/default/deploy

    I double checked the username, password and database name settings in the file were correct

Step 9 – Check Your Work
Now I checked my handy work before moving on to the next step.

  1. I made the JBoss run script executable
    $ chmod +x $JBOSS_HOME/bin/run.sh
  2. Next I ran the script
    $ $JBOSS_HOME/bin/run.sh

    It will take a while but, eventually the server will finish booting.

  3. Now I hit the basic JBoss AS home page at this URL: http://myserver/ and made sure it looked OK.
  4. Then I hit the page at this URL: http://myserver/portal and checked it as well.

If you have trouble accessing your URL, there could be an issue with the address that JBoss is listening on. This can be caused by various issues with your server setup (hostname, hosts file etc.). One quick thing to try is to pass -b 0.0.0.0 as an argument to the run.sh script – this tells JBoss to listen on all addresses, which might help you figure out where the issue is.

Step 10 – Setup as a Service

  1. I opened the file $JBOSS_HOME/bin/jboss_init_redhat.sh in an editor.
  2. First I double checked the environment variables set at the top of the file (particularly JBOSS_HOME and JBOSS_USER) were correct.
  3. Then at the very top of the file, below the shebang line, I added the following 3 lines to make the script compatible with the chkconfig system

    # Comments to support chkconfig
    # chkconfig: 2345 80 40
    # description:

    I saved the file and exited the editor.

  4. Then I made it executable

    $ chmod +x $JBOSS_HOME/bin/jboss_init_redhat.sh
  5. Next I linked the script into the init.d directory

    $ ln -s $JBOSS_HOME/bin/jboss_init_redhat.sh /etc/init.d/jboss
  6. Then I ran chkconfig to register the script for the correct run levels

    $ chkconfig –add jboss
  7. I then started the server by hand to double check my work and also just to get the server up and running without having to do a reboot

    $ service jboss start
  8. Then I hit the page once again and checked that it came up properly

Step 11 – Have A
It is always appropriate to reward yourself with a craft, micro-brewed or home-brewed !

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