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We're currently setting up a new application hosting environment on Rackspace and are struggling to find a package for Tomcat 7.

Our previous provider was Amazon and we ran on Amazon Linux who via their amzn-updates-Base repo made available a Tomcat 7 package which we were using. Our new provider Rackspace has us setup on RHEL 6.4. Apparently the RedHat EUS Server repos that we're using only have Tomcat 6 available. We also checked into the Rackspace IUS repo and Fedora's EPEL (Extra Packages for Linux) repo but neither appear to have a package for Tomcat 7.

We're well aware that Tomcat is Java and thus isn't dependant on a particular architecture, and that there are many "How to install Tomcat 7 on linux" tutorials online but they are just steps taken by some random engineer who then posted it to their blog. Going this route seems like a big step back from leveraging a maintained package that: 1) We know is setup correctly, securely and 2) We can receive updates via yum with.

Tomcat 7 has been out for 3 years now and in fact Tomcat 8 is now in beta. I'm quite surprised that none of the larger organizations like RedHat has picked up version 7. So, question to you all: how would you recommend that we (and other people in similar situations) proceed?

Options that we see are:

  1. Do a manual download, setup of startup scripts, user account, etc ourselves and check back at various intervals to see if there's any updates (security or otherwise). Concern here is whether we get this right or not.

  2. Use Tomcat 6 packages - doesn't appear to have huge changes in version 7 but we've not tested our product with this version and would prefer to not have to test our app in both app server version environments.

  3. Continue seeking a proper tomcat 7 package - seems that we're unlikely to find anything credible.

Update:
Another potential option that was pointed out is to build our own tomcat7 package. I found a GitHub project that could be a good starting point: https://github.com/bdwyertech/rpm-tomcat7

Marplesoft
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  • another option is to package it yourself, not ideal but manageable. – faker Mar 11 '14 at 18:05
  • @faker good point, I will edit the question and add that as an option. I actually found a github project that we could potentially use as a starting point. – Marplesoft Mar 11 '14 at 18:33

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EPEL testing does include Tomcat 7 : http://pkgs.org/centos-6/epel-testing-i386/tomcat-7.0.33-3.el6.noarch.rpm.html

CJONES
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  • Thanks for pointing that out. I wasn't aware of that. I guess this is another option. We'd just need to consider whether we trust the 'testing' repo. – Marplesoft Mar 11 '14 at 18:41
  • This will be a problem not only of trust but support... if you care about support that is. None of this is "officially" supported. Though perhaps the new RHEL "software collections" (still in beta) are a step in the right direction. Since using those you would be running an unsupported package but not modifying or interfering with any official packages or libraries. – CJONES Mar 11 '14 at 19:03
  • Yes very true about the testing repo. I agree RHEL software collections looks promising but doesn't include Tomcat. – Marplesoft Mar 11 '14 at 21:10
  • By now it is not in the testing repository anymore, it has been moved into the regular EPEL repository (name: `tomcat`). – faker Oct 24 '14 at 06:57
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A supported version of Tomcat7 is available via the add-on entitlement for JBoss. Red Hat has stated that there will not be a Tomcat7 in the RHEL6 base channels.

https://access.redhat.com/site/solutions/128503

RHN login is required to view.

user216682
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  • Could you quote the relevant information from that link? – MichelZ Apr 16 '14 at 13:44
  • I don't want to quote the not-publicly-accessible content from Redhat, but I'll confirm that the link explicitly states tomcat7 won't be available for RHEL6 outside of JBoss add-on entitlements. – Joshua Miller Apr 16 '14 at 16:12
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Actually i'm using tomcat 7.0.70 with jdk6 on a centos 6.8 I followed the update wrote by marplesoft about the presence on gitub of a specfile, here: https://github.com/bdwyertech/rpm-tomcat7

A small modification to the "version" field of specfile, to use tomcat 7.0.70, and then the installation went smootly. Actually tomcat is up, but there are no applications running on, as it is a base installation for test activities. I think it's a clean way: there is no need to add an unofficial repository - i cannot use them - but let to update tomcat when necessary, building rpm.

Lorenzo Migliardi
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