Installing Confluence EAR-WAR on Weblogic

This documentation provides a guide to install Confluence on Weblogic 9.2 with basic settings and an external database. Examples on the page are given for Windows. Instructions for Linux should be similar to this guide.

On this page:

Step 1. Check the Known Issues

Peruse the Known Issues for WebLogic.

Step 2. Create a Weblogic Domain

Assuming that your Weblogic has been installed in C:\bea, follow these steps:

1. Open Weblogic Configuration Wizard:

   C:\bea\weblogic92\common\bin\consolew.exe /NOWINDOW /c "C:\bea\weblogic92\common\bin\config.cmd
   

   OR

   Start >> Programs >> BEA Products >> Tools >> Configuration Wizard
   

2. Choose Create New Weblogic Domain
3. Click next all the way.
4. You will be prompted to enter your Weblogic's admin account, enter and click next.
5. Sun's JDK is recommended.
6. Click next until prompted for a domain name. Enter confluence.

More information can be found in BEA documentation.

Step 3. Configuring Confluence

1. Download the Confluence EAR/WAR zip file. (You need to click the 'Show all' link to see the EAR/WAR zip file.)
2. Check your unzip program before extracting the downloaded zip file. Some archive-extract programs cause errors when unzipping the Confluence zip file:
   • Windows users must avoid the Windows built-in unzip utility, as it doesn't extract all the files. Use a third-party unzip program like 7Zip or Winzip.
   • Solaris users will need to use GNU tar to handle the long file names.
3. Extract the downloaded zip file.
4. You have now unzipped your Confluence installation directory, which should contain the version number e.g. confluence-3.0. This directory will be later referred to as the Confluence installation directory. Inside is a confluence subdirectory, referred to later as the (Exploded) Confluence WAR directory. Record the absolute path to the Confluence WAR directory.
5. Modify its confluence-init.properties and set Confluence Home.
   1. Inside the Confluence installation directory, edit ...confluence/WEB-INF/classes/confluence-init.properties in a text editor.
   2. Now define your Confluence Home directory, by setting the confluence.home property to a directory of your choosing.
      We suggest using different paths for your installation and home directories. This will facilitate upgrades. This is the directory that will contain all of Confluence's configuration, backup and attachment files.
      Tip: Another term for 'Home directory' would be 'data directory'.
6. Replace the confluence/WEB-INF/web.xml with confluence/WEB-INF/web.servlet2-4.xml. See Known Issues for Weblogic.
7. Create a file called weblogic.xml in <confluence install directory>\confluence\WEB-INF with the following content:

   <?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
   <weblogic-web-app
    xmlns="http://www.bea.com/ns/weblogic/90"
    xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
    xsi:schemaLocation="http://www.bea.com/ns/weblogic/90 http://www.bea.com/ns/weblogic/90/weblogic-web-app.xsd">
       <jsp-descriptor>
   	    <precompile>false</precompile>
       </jsp-descriptor>
       <container-descriptor>
               <servlet-reload-check-secs>-1</servlet-reload-check-secs>
               <prefer-web-inf-classes>true</prefer-web-inf-classes>
       </container-descriptor>
       <context-root>yourContextPathName</context-root>
   </weblogic-web-app>
   

<container-descriptor>
   <prefer-web-inf-classes>true</prefer-web-inf-classes>
</container-descriptor>

This parameter allows Weblogic to prefer the libraries from Confluence and in many cases helps to solve many libraries conflict. However, depending on the library version you have in your installation this parameter can also cause Confluence fail to start. If that happens you need to figure out which package is causing the conflict. A related bug reports for this issue has been filed in CONF-15163 and in CONF-15332, however these bugs have been fixed for version 3.1 of Confluence.

If you discover that Weblogic still uses its own library despite of setting the prefer-web-inf-classes field to true, you may need to tell it explicitly to load the correct jar version. Please refer to Forcing Weblogic to load certain Jar files in Weblogic Configuration Tips.

The full weblogic.xml syntax is described in BEA's documentation.

Step 4. Install Confluence with Weblogic and an External Database via Direct JDBC

1. Create a Weblogic Domain eg. your_domain_name
2. Go to C:\bea\user_projects\domains\your_domain_name\lib and place the JDBC driver here.
3. Start Weblogic Admin Server.
4. Access Weblogic Admin console: http://localhost:7001/console
5. On the left hand panel, click Lock & Edit
6. On the left hand panel, look up Domain Structure > your_domain_name > Deployments
7. Click on the Install button and look up for your Confluence installation folder. Eg. c:\atlassian\confluence\war\confluence-3\confluence.
8. Once you found the folder, click on the radio button and click Next all the way.
9. Name the deployment as confluence.
10. Click Finish.
11. On the left hand panel, click Activate Changes.

Step 5. Starting Confluence

1. Start your Weblogic Admin Server
2. Go to Deployments and locate your installed Confluence
3. Tick Confluence
4. Click on Start button and choose Servicing all requests
5. Click Yes

To access Confluence go to http://localhost:7001/yourContextPathName and you can proceed to Confluence Setup guide Step number 2.

RELATED TOPICS

Known Issues for Weblogic