Overview of the Installation Procedure

Terracotta Ehcache Installation Guide : Overview of the Installation Procedure

Performing the Installation

The Terracotta Ehcache distribution kit is provided as an archive file containing Jar files, command line scripts and other associated files.

The installation procedure just consists of downloading the archive file from Software AG's Software Download Center (SDC) and expanding the archive file to a suitable disk location in your working environment.

When you order the product, you receive credentials from Software AG that allow you to access the SDC. Within the SDC, navigate to "Home > Products & Documentation > Download Products > Software Download Center", and select the entry for your ordered product to download the archive file.

After you have expanded the archive to a disk location in your working environment, the root folder of the expanded archive contains a Readme file that summarizes the contents of the kit. We suggest that you read through the Readme file to familiarize yourself with the contents of the kit.

In some cases, as noted below, you need to add components from the expanded archive to your classpath.

Installation of Jar Files

The expanded archive contains the following Jar files:

1. client/lib/terracotta-common-client-<version>.jar

2. client/ehcache/terracotta-ehcache-client-<version>.jar

3. client/logging/slf4j-api-<version>.jar

In order to use Terracotta Ehcache in your application, you need to add these Jar files to your application classpath.

Note:

The Jar file in client/logging is the logging abstraction that Terracotta Ehcache uses, and it requires a concrete implementation to offer logging. By default the native kit bundles logback in client/logging/impl, but you are free to choose any supported implementation. See the Simple Logging Facility for Java (SLF4J) pages at https://www.slf4j.org/ for related information.

Configuring Your Environment

After you have installed the product as described above, there are various configuration activities that you will need to perform in order to set up the product environment and to run your application(s). We suggest that you proceed as follows:

1. If you have not already done so, familiarize yourself with the general concepts of Terracotta Ehcache.

See the document About Terracotta Ehcache for an overview of the product.

2. Configure the Terracotta Server to define the cache storage tiers that you will use, and the size of each storage tier. This involves setting up an XML-formatted configuration file that contains all of the information to define the topology of the Terracotta Server.

For details, see the section The Terracotta Configuration File in the document Terracotta Server Administration Guide, and also check through the Ehcache API Developer Guide for various examples and explanations.

3. Start the Terracotta Server.

See the document Starting and Stopping the Terracotta Server for instructions on starting the Terracotta Server.

4. If you intend to use a high availability (HA) topology, you can start several instances of the Terracotta Server one after the other, all using the same configuration file. Such as group of servers is termed a stripe. In a stripe, one of the servers becomes the active server and the others become the passive servers. A stripe can also consist of just an active server and no passive servers.

5. If you intend to use a clustered cache in your Ehcache application, you can use the Cluster Tool to set up a cluster that connects several stripes.

For a general overview of clustered caches, see the section Clustered Caches in the Developer Guide. For an overview of the cluster tool, see the document The Cluster Tool.

6. Develop your caching application(s) using the Ehcache API.

See the Ehcache API Developer Guide for details of how to develop applications that use the Ehcache API.

7. Start your Ehcache application(s) using your standard operating system means or your IDE.

8. While your application is running, check the status of the running system (information about which applications are running, which caches are in use, cache usage metrics etc.) by using the Terracotta Management Console (TMC).

See the document Terracotta Management and Monitoring for an overview of the TMC.

Overview of Command Line Scripts

The distribution kit contains command line scripts that you can use to start and stop various components of the Terracotta Ehcache environment. The table below lists the scripts that you will probably use most frequently. The file type of the scripts is ".bat" for Windows or ".sh" for UNIX/Linux.

Script	Description
server/bin/start-tc-server	Start the Terracotta Server. The Terracotta Server provides the distributed data platform for Terracotta products.
tools/cluster-tool/bin/cluster-tool	Start the cluster tool. The cluster tool is a command line tool that allows you as administrator of the Terracotta Server Array (TSA) to perform a variety of tasks in the area of cluster management.
tools/management/bin/start tools/management/bin/stop	Start or stop the Terracotta Management Console (TMC). The TMC is a web-based tool for managing and monitoring your Terracotta Server Array and connected clients.

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