[jboss-as7-dev] Problems with .deploy markers in shared directories

[Brian Stansberry]

The deployment-scanner and the CLI are both clients using the management 
API. Under the covers, they both do the same thing -- take an archive 
somewhere on the filesystem and upload it to the server, which stores it 
in data/content and then deploys it.

The deployment-scanner is for people who prefer to use OS gestures (like 
the cp command) as their user interface instead of using the CLI.

On 4/4/12 12:47 AM, Bela Ban wrote:
> I understand the CLI places applications into a separate directory
> ('data' ?), so I'm wondering why we have 2 different locations:
> 'deployments' for manual deployment and 'data' for deploying via the CLI ?
>
> If this is the case, then this would be inconsistent
>
>
> On 4/3/12 10:41 PM, Brian Stansberry wrote:
>> Did this kind of deployment dir sharing work on previous AS releases? I
>> suppose it might have for .war files since IIRC wars were copied into
>> tmp/. For other deployment types I believe doing this would have led to
>> file lock problems on Windows.
>>
>> Anyway, I've opened https://issues.jboss.org/browse/AS7-4383 to look
>> into not writing marker files or optionally writing them in data/. Part
>> of the purpose of those marker files was a request that we provide in
>> the dir itself input to users as to what was happening with the
>> deployment.
>>
>> Even if AS7-4383 were done I don't think *exploded* deployments would
>> work reliably at all if scanners on multiple servers were scanning the
>> same dir. There would likely be file lock problems and deleting the
>> .deployed file is the intended trigger for undeploy. Deleting the
>> deployment itself also triggers undeploy, but it is very dangerous to do
>> it that way for an exploded deployment.
>>
>> More in-line...
>>
>> On 3/30/12 7:34 AM, Bela Ban wrote:
>>> I have a big problem with the way AS deploys applications: I have a
>>> web.war and a cluster of AS 7.1.1 instances.
>>>
>>> Each instance has separate work, data, log, tmp etc directories
>>> (jboss.node.name, jboss.server.data.dir, jboss.server.temp.dir etc).
>>>
>>> I have a $HOME/jboss/standalone/deployments dir into which I copied
>>> web.war, assuming that web.war is an application that can be shared by
>>> all cluster nodes.... However, the markers screw things up, as they
>>> actually modify things.
>>>
>>> The first node is started and adds a suffix web.war.dodeply -->
>>> .isdploying --> .deployed.
>>>
>>> The second node is started and does the same. (The weird thing is why
>>> does the 2nd node even deploy web.war anymore, as the marker .deployed
>>> suggested that the app has already been deployed !)
>>>
>>
>> It knows it's not deployed, because it can check the server-side state.
>>
>>> However, if I start a few nodes concurrently, then this lifecycle is
>>> screwed, and I end up with some nodes having web.war deployed and others
>>> not. This apparently gets sorted out, and after some time the marker is
>>> .deployed again. But this spits out nasty warnings in-between.
>>>
>>> Is there a recommended way to share web.war between cluster nodes ?
>>>
>>
>> Recommended is to use the CLI to do the deployments. This can be
>> scripted easily enough if you know the addresses/ports the servers are
>> listening on. (I realize that may be a problem in some situations.)
>>
>> You can also configure the AS to use a deployment at a specific location:
>>
>> <deployments>
>> <deployment name="demo.war" runtime-name="demo.war">
>> <fs-archive path="demo.war" relative-to="user.home"/>
>> </deployment>
>> </deployments>
>>
>> The value for fs-archive "path" can be absolute if the relative-to
>> attribute is not used.
>>
>> I just filed a JIRA to make it easier to set this up via the CLI:
>>
>> https://issues.jboss.org/browse/AS7-4385
>>
>>> IMO, markers should be in the *data* dir for a node, which can easily be
>>> separated by using -Djboss.server.data.dir=xxx !
>>>
>>
>> See above; the request was to provide input to the user as to what went
>> on. The user is not meant to look in the data/ dir; it's the AS' private
>> playground. Also, the recommended trigger for undeploy is deleting the
>> .deployed file.
>>
>>> What's the recommended way to share applications between nodes ? (I
>>> tried domain mode, but couldn't get it to work after half a day...)
>>>
>>> If this is an RTFM, perhaps I didn't google enough, then let me know !
>>>
>>
>>
>


-- 
Brian Stansberry
Principal Software Engineer
JBoss by Red Hat