LAMS installation and configuration

Definition

This page contains installation tips for LAMS

LAMS is a JAVA/JBoss-based application and needs some installation skills on Windows and good installation skills for Unix.

LAMS 2RC2 Windows XP PC

Do not try to install LAMS if you lack basic installation experience and technical reading skills. Here are just a few remarks in addition to the LAMS installation instructions. I also strongly suggest to look at the Problems Installing LAMS Forum.

Other Software

To run it on windows you need to install other software.

• Java JSE 5.0 (update 9), not just the JRE. Get it from Sun.
• MySQL: Get it directly from MySQL and take the Installer version (not the zip installation).
  • Install it and remember the password
  • I suggest not installing/using a WAMP environment for LAMS 2RC 2. The LAMS installer 2Rc2 could not find MySQL in my WampServer environment even if it was told where to look for in the LAMS installer.
  • Hack would be to manually edit the registry with this information from MySQL AB and this posting and picture by Ernie Ghiglione. Bascially one needs to reproduce the MySQL entry from the official MysQL AB installer:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE
  SOFTWARE
    MySQL AB
      MySQL Server 5.0  
                         Location c:\wamp\mysql
                         Version  5.0.27

... but this still didn't work for me.

MySQL

• If you use a WAMP package you must know where MySQL sits. E.g. c:\wamp\mysql if you work with "WampServer" (but see above that I failed, rather work with an "official MySQL installer from MySQL AB). If you use the official MySQL installer, there will be no problem.

LAMS

• Has an installer and if you got the above right it will install without problems. You may have a firewall. In this case make sure to open the necessary ports. Also pay attention to popup blockers in your navigator. LAMS worked fine with both IE 6 and Firefox 1.5x.

Lams 2.0 on On Solaris

Lams 2.0 was released on december 6 2006.

First, read the instructions in Building LAMS 'and Development Environment

Other software

• Solaris 10 ought to have the right java + ant installed.

• Make sure that you also have a MySQL 5.x and create a lams database with a lams user

• JBOSS (Java application server)
  • Unpackage into /usr/local

gtar xzf jboss-4.0.2.tar.gz -C /usr/local 

• Copy some jar files

cp /usr/local/jboss-4.0.2/server/all/lib/jboss-cache.jar /usr/local/jboss-4.0.2/server/default/lib/
cp /usr/local/jboss-4.0.2/server/all/lib/jgroups.jar /usr/local/jboss-4.0.2/server/default/lib/

LAMS source file download

* UK
* Australia

LAMS pre-build configuration

I configured the following entries in the following files. Most entries are related to file paths.

In lams_build directory:

File: lams/lams_build/shared.properties
  (nothing to change)
 
File: lams/lams_build/common.properties
  osPropertiesName=unix
  db.password=XXXX

File: lams/lams_build/unix.properties
  contentrepository.directory=/usr/local/lams/repository

Change this in three locations !!

File: lams_build/conf/unix/jboss/service/mysql-ds.xml
   <password>XXXX</password>

In lams_common directory:

File: lams/lams_common/db/sql/insert_unix_config_data.sql
  ('ServerURL','http://tecfasun1.unige.ch:8080/lams/');
  ('TempDir','/usr/local/lams/temp');
  ('DumpDir','/usr/local/lams/dump');
  ('SMTPServer','mail.tecfa.unige.ch');
  ('LamsSupportEmail','webmaster@tecfa.unige.ch');
  ('ContentRepositoryPath','/usr/local/lams/repository');   

... Don't miss the port number for the server URL (e.g. 8080) !

In the same directory you may change the admin login and password (not tested !)

File: lams/lams_common/db/sql/insert_users.sql  

Note: I did not find an LamsHome property in any file (this conflicts with the installation instructions).

Make directories for lams (they must match the above of course)

mkdir /usr/local/lams
mkdir /usr/local/lams/temp
mkdir /usr/local/lams/dump
mkdir /usr/local/lams/repository

I don't know who runs jboss, so I just deproteced

chmod -R 777 /usr/local/lams

Build

Type the following commands in this order. (You don't need Ecplise to build LAMS). But stop the JBOSS server when you do this.

cd /src/lams/lams_build

ant rebuild-db
ant assemble-ear
ant deploy-ear
ant deploy-tools
ant copyfiles

Run it

cd /usr/local/jboss-4.0.2/bin/
./run.sh &

The sysadmin login password is in the SQL file below. You may change it before you build, I was quite frustrated not to able to log in ;)

/src/lams/lams_common/db/sql/insert_users.sql

Server configuration

See Configuring your LAMS Server.

• Java may not have enough heap space (it runs out of memory). Replace the 256 with something bigger. I think that the run.sh has to be fixed. Otherwise it may be the Tomcat config somewhere.

File: /usr/local/jboss-4.0.2/bin/run.sh

Around line 150 insert:

JAVA_OPTS="$JAVA_OPTS -Xms500m -Xmx500m -Dprogram.name=$PROGNAME"
# Display our environment

Debug

Look at files in:

/usr/local/jboss-4.0.2/server/default/log/

Then stop jboss,

cd /usr/local/jboss-4.0.2/bin/shutdown -S &

Repair misconfigurations above, rebuild with ant and run it again :) I don't know if global cleaning up is an efficient idea, but I do it anyhow as a last resort when I get stuck, e.g.:

1. Execute ant clean
2. Drop the lams database (and don't forget to create it again)
3. Empty the jboss server/default/deploy/lams.ear/ directory ?

Things I did wrong

• Forget to specif the os
• Forgot to add the port number of the server URL
• Forgot to create the lams directory
• Only changed password in one location in lams_build/conf/unix/jboss/service/mysql-ds.xml

Current problem

Lams is deployed and the login screen is there, but not enough heap space (fixing it now)

Moodle - LAMS integration

• We will try it with LAMS 2RC2 (not done yet)

Documentation

• LAMS installation on CentOS 4 (RHEL 4) (LAMS 1.x)
• Category:LAMS in the Moodle Wiki
• LAMS and Moodle Integration Walkthrough (LAMS 1.x)