RE: RE: Undesired behaviour when installing DXP on WebLogic Server

txapeldot ., modified 2 Years ago. Junior Member Posts: 91 Join Date: 1/15/15 Recent Posts

I'm trying to carry out an installation process of Liferay DXP 7.1.10-ga1 on a WebLogic server (12.2.1.3), and I'm doing it according to the steps describen in the Liferay's official documentation (Installing Liferay DXP on WebLogic 12c R2).

On the WebLogic server, I'm using the default WebLogic's AdminServer, which has been targeted within the deployment I've also set up. This deployment is linked to the DXP .war file, which has been previously modified to include an accordingly modified 'portal-ext.properties' file to set up the 'liferay.home' property.

The process of installation works as expected, and I achieve doing a first installation, and create a first user. The weird thing is that every time I shut down the Admin Server and start it again, a new process of installation gets started, which is an undesired behaviour because that initial installation process of Liferay DXP has already been carried out. What I'd expect when starting the Admin Server is that the Liferay DXP welcome window is displayed.

I guess I'm doind something wrong but I don't know what it could be. I guess this undeseried behaviour relies on the way WebLogic server works but I have no experience with WebLogic.

I'd really appreciate if someone could explain to me what I'm doing wrong and how could avoid the process of installation to appear every time I start the Admin Server.

Thanks in advance.

thumbnail
Olaf Kock, modified 2 Years ago. Liferay Legend Posts: 6441 Join Date: 9/23/08 Recent Posts

You've been all over installing old CE and DXP versions on Weblogic recently, now you're going back even further.

As you ask about DXP: Please note that the premium support phase for 7.1 has ended by now, but you still might use your DXP contract to open a support ticket: You'll likely get better help there, and it's what you end up paying for.

Also, you might want to try installing the latest fix/service-pack, rather than GA1: If there were any known issues, they might have long been fixed.

I have no experience on Weblogic, but if you consistently see the setup-wizard, note that you can disable it in portal-ext.properties. Typically it does so by itself, by writing portal-setup-wizard.properties with the proper settings (that you entered during setup). If you don't want the setup-wizard to ask again, and if (e.g. for permissions) it couldn't write that file, you might need to set this manually.

txapeldot ., modified 2 Years ago. Junior Member Posts: 91 Join Date: 1/15/15 Recent Posts

Thanks for your reply.

Due to corporate issues I have no chance to get support from Liferay, otherwise I'd not be asking here...

Moreover, I don't think the problem relies on Liferay DXP side, but on WebLogic, because using the some DXP .war file on a Tomcat appserver (following the steps described on Liferay official documentation) I don't experience this undesired behaviour, that is, when I launch Tomcat's 'startup.bat', Liferay DXP gets started and the Liferay welcome page appears.

On WebLogic, once the intallation has finished, the property 'setup.wizard.enabled' is set to 'false' within the $(LR_HOME)/portal-setup-wizard.properties file. That's why I think it all is a weird behaviour of Liferay on WebLogic.

thumbnail
Olaf Kock, modified 2 Years ago. Liferay Legend Posts: 6441 Join Date: 9/23/08 Recent Posts

That's a funny corporate setup: Purchase support but keep people from using it...

That might be something to work on that can have a big impact. In general: Nothing wrong with looking for information here. My recommendation is just to utilize what you pay for, as you might get better support there. Weblogic is not exactly the platform that many people have experience with and​​​​​​ also​ hang out on voluntary Open Source message boards.

txapeldot ., modified 2 Years ago. Junior Member Posts: 91 Join Date: 1/15/15 Recent Posts

I've sorted the problem out, and although I know very few people use WebLogic as appserver, I'd like to share how I've managed to avoid the Basic Configuration window to appear every time WebLogic's managed server is started.

Contrarily to what it's said in the step Setting Liferay DXP Properties, I haven't included a 'portal-ext.properties' file within the DXP.war file, and, as a consecuence, the 'liferay.home' property is not defined. That way, the file 'portal-setup-wizard.properties' (which defines the property 'liferay.home') is placed into the WL's $(DOMAINS) folder, and being in that path, DXP is able to find the 'portal-setup-wizard.properties' file, and get the value of the 'setup.wizard.enabled' property (wich values 'false'), and determine the installation process has already been carried out. And knowing that, the process of installation is not carried out again.

In Setting Liferay DXP Properties, it's stated that "In WebLogic, your domain’s folder is generally Liferay Home". But, in my opinion that's incorrect. What I think is that in WebLogic, Liferay Home points to WL's $(DOMAINS) folder, not $(USER_DOMAIN) folder, which are things completely different.

Moreover, in the same section it's stated that "If you need to make any changes to portal-ext.properties' after Liferay DXP deploys, you can find it in your domain’s autodeploy/ROOT/WEB-INF/classes folder. Note that the autodeploy/ROOT folder contains the Liferay DXP deployment". Again, I think that's incorrect because, once Liferay DXP is deployed, it's not located in that path; I don't know where exactly it is, but not on that location.

I hope this all can be useful for anyone facing the same problem.