Splunk for Websphere Application Server

Recently I had to monitor and analyze the logs after go live for couple of days . Attended Splunk training earlier but didn't get chance to use it much and started exploring it.

1. Basic installation is simple , downloaded the latest version from

http://www.splunk.com/download

For the installation instructions ,check this video

http://www.splunk.com/view/SP-CAAAGXB

2. After successful installation , it asked me to enter the userid and password  (For the first time login default user id and password are "admin/changeme")

http://siva-pc:8000/en-US/account  

3. For simple log file analysis like log4j logs … etc , you just need to feed the input data or log files

4. Splunk provides out of the box App to analyze and monitor websphere appserver server config and logs (events).
5. You can install this WAS app from the Splunk UI directly

                    6. provide the Splunk account details to download the app , once the installation is done it asks restart.

You need provide the was admin crendentials If you want to gather the JMX metrics (Like WAS out of the box  PMI metrics). 

By default it provides couple of dashboards

On each WAS machine from which you will collect log data, you must install a Splunk universal forwarder and the Splunk Forwarder Add-on for WAS. If you want to collect JMX performance data, then you must have a stand-alone host with network access to the WAS Deployment Manager and an installed Splunk universal forwarder with the Splunk Forwarder Appliance Add-on for WAS installed. To collect, search,and store the data in your environment you must have a Splunk instance with the Splunk App for WAS installed.

Note: As I have single server , I have installed it as a standalone App , In this case you do not need the FA or the Forwarder Add-ons.

For detailed integration information , check the below link

Resources:

http://docs.splunk.com/Documentation/WAS

Installing CTC 3.0.0.1 (Content Template Catalog) on WCM 7

Download the content template solution (CTC 3.0.0.1) for the websphere 7

https://greenhouse.lotus.com/plugins/plugincatalog.nsf/assetDetails.xsp?action=editDocument&documentId=9867495EE281C75985257919004DBBEB

Download the portal solution installation (1.2.0.6) for the Websphere portal

https://greenhouse.lotus.com/plugins/plugincatalog.nsf/assetDetails.xsp?action=editDocument&documentId=3E21DDAB3EE4DC598525775E00576826

Pre-requisites

IBM WebSphere Portal 7.0.0.1 plus Combined Cumulative Fix 008 or higher must be installed

Upgrading WP 7.0 to WPS 7.0.0.1 and CF19

System Requirements

http://www-01.ibm.com/support/docview.wss?uid=swg27024028

Download Fix from

http://www-01.ibm.com/support/docview.wss?uid=swg24027857

Or

http://www-933.ibm.com/support/fixcentral/swg/selectFixes?parent=ibm~WebSphere&product=ibm/WebSphere/WebSphere+Portal&release=All&platform=All&function=aparId&apars=PM75289

Portal Update Installer

http://www-01.ibm.com/support/docview.wss?rs=688&uid=swg24006942

Health checker tool

http://www-01.ibm.com/support/docview.wss?uid=swg27020200

After downloading fix and update installer

1. Create the directory "update" under the portal server (c:/IBM/Websphere/PortalServer/update)
2. Copy the extracted update installer files into that directory
3. Created "fixes" directory under update folder (c:/IBM/Websphere/PortalServer/update/fixes)
4. Copy the extracted fix pack files into the 'fixes' directory
5. Extract and copy the healthchecker.zip from the update installer directory to portal server root (C:/IBM/WebSphere/PortalServer). This just contains a filename called "upgrade_health_check.xml" and this gets copied to "C:\IBM\WebSphere\PortalServer\installer\wp.config\config\includes" folder.
6. Run the Heathchecker tool to validate the existing environment

C:\IBM\WebSphere\wp_profile\ConfigEngine>ConfigEngine.bat -DRequiredWAS=7.0.0.13 action-health-check-validation

Build failed with following error

The specified product version is not supported: version=7.0.0.11

7. So WAS is not up to required fix level , so I had to upgrade WAS first (from 7.0.0.11 to 7.0.0.13)
8. Once the WAS upgrade is successful, run the updatePortalWizard.bat
9. Installation was successful.

Upgrading WAS from 7.0.0.11 to 7.0.0.13

WAS fix list

http://www-01.ibm.com/support/docview.wss?rs=180&uid=swg27014463

WAS update installer download

http://www-01.ibm.com/support/docview.wss?rs=180&uid=swg24020448

1. Download and extract files to "temp" folder , 
2. Execute the "setupCmdLine.bat" from WAS_Root/bin folder
3. Run the following command

When I just run the  "install" command , I got the following error "Java could not be found, please specify -is:javahome <java_home_dir> even though I set the environment variables  (my local WAS instance is not installed in default location that is "c:/program files/IBM/WebSphere/AppServer")

I had to execute the following command to start the wizard properly (Make sure path is valid in responsefile.updiinstaller.txt).

C:\IBM\WP7\WebSphere\AppServer\UpdateInstaller>install -options C:\IBM\WP7\WebSphere\AppServer\UpdateInstaller\responsefile.updiinstaller.txt -is:javahome C:\IBM\WP7\WebSphere\AppServer\java

1. After the update installer installed, install the maintenance pack. ( I ran into problem where it was not able to delete some of the files while installing, and had to restart the machine. So suggest to restart the machine after start installing the maintenance pack )
2. Retried after server restart and it is installed successfully.

Installing the Portal Solution Installer

1. From the extracted directory , update the settings.properties file

C:\temp\SolutionInstaller\commands\windows

2. Execute the C:\temp\SolutionInstaller\commands\windows>install-SolutionInstaller.bat

Installing CTC 

1. From the CTC-install directory , update the profile path in ctc.properties and execute C:\temp\CTCInstall3001>ctc-install.bat
2. Eexecute the folowing command C:\temp\CTCInstall3001>ctc-install.bat

Note: You can find more details specific to CTC installation options like how to disable CTC-Demo , or CTC-Theme …etc in the documentation provided in the downloaded zip file

IBM Portal/WCM documentation

Came across new IBM portal/WCM documentation.

Check this link

Resources :

http://infolib.lotus.com/resources/gs/portal8/

Copy entire WCM library : WCM 8

There was no direct way to copy the entire WCM library earlier (One of possible ways that I tried to copy the site content is posted couple of years back).

But with WCM 8, you can create the copy of the entire WCM library using simple ConfigEngine tasks (Similar to one used for import/export).

ConfigEngine.bat export-library-copy -DLibraryPath=path_to_export_file -DLibraryName=library_name_to_export -DWasPassword=password -DPortalAdminPwd=password

ConfigEngine.bat import-library-copy -DLibraryPath=path_to_export_file -DLibraryName=library_name_to_import -DWasPassword=password -DPortalAdminPwd=password

NOTE:

1. When you export a library as a copy, new IDs are generated for all items in the library. This ensures that there are no conflicts with existing libraries or items when you import the copy into a web content server that already contains the original library. In this way, you can perform multiple imports to the same web content server, resulting in a new library for each import.

Please refer to Info center link provided below for more information.

Resources:

1. http://infolib.lotus.com/resources/portal/8.0.0/doc/en_us/PT800ACD004/wcm/wcm_config_wcmlibrary_exportcopy.html

Updates to inline editing feature in the WCM 8.0.0.1

Was going through the WCM 8.0.0.1 changes and came across the following updates to inline editing feature in the WCM 8.0.0.1.

Creating URL node under content root directly

If you observe closely , you don’t have option to create the URL node under the “Content Root” in manage pages portlet.

But still you can create a one using simple work around i.e create the URL node in another level and move it content root. This works fine J .