Running Solr on Azure

Question

Can Solr be run on Azure?

Since this is the #1 Google result for "solr on azure" I think it's worth adding this now that it's available: http://www.interoperabilitybridges.com/Azure/Getting_Started_Guide_Solr_Lucene.asp — Andrew Hare, Dec 14 '11 at 00:36

score 11 · Answer 1 · answered Aug 14 '11 at 20:25

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I know this thread is old, but I wanted to share our two cents. We are running SOLR on Azure with no big problems. We've created a startup task to install Java and create the deployment, and we have a SOLR instance on each web role. From there on, it's a bit of magic figuring out which master/slave configuration, but we've solved that too.

So yes, it can be done with a little bit of work. Most importantly, the startup task is key. Index doesn't have to be stored anywhere but on local disk (Local Resource), because indexing is part of the role startup. If you have to speed it up and a few minute differences are acceptable, you can have the index synced with a blob storage copy every once in a while by the master. But in this case you need to implement a voting algorithm so that the SOLR instances don't override each other.

We'll be posting info on our blog, but I don't want to post links in answers for old threads because I'll look like a spammer :o)

answered Aug 14 '11 at 20:25

Anže Vodovnik

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Cool, please add your blog post if you want to. – HaavardMeling Aug 15 '11 at 06:41
Can you share link to blog that explains how to use this? – Krunal Dec 19 '15 at 13:22
The blog has since been deleted, as it was hosted on a company page, and that company has now closed. However, these days it's a bad move to try and replicate this, as Azure has grown a lot in terms of features. One of them, is also [Azure Search](https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/services/search/) which basically takes all this pain away from you. If that's too expensive for you, you can try [Algolia](https://www.algolia.com), which is a cheaper alternative, but does the same thing more or less. If none of that works, keep in mind that disks are now persistent. – Anže Vodovnik Dec 20 '15 at 17:48

HB Trojan · Answer 2 · 2017-03-21T20:30:53.383

Abit of a dated question, but wanted to provide an updated answer. You can run Apache Solr on Azure. Azure offers IaaS (Infrastructure as a service), which is raw Virtual Machines running Linux/Windows. You can choose to set up your entire Solr cluster on a set of VMs and configure SolrCloud and Zookeeper on them.

If you are interested, you could also check out Solr-as-a-Service or Hosted Solr solutions as they remove the headache of setting up SolrCloud on Azure. There's a lot that goes into running, managing and scaling a search infrastructure and companies like Measured Search help reduce time and effort spent on doing that. You get back that time in developing features and functionality that your applications or products need.

More specifically, if you are doing it yourself, it can take many days to weeks to give the proper love and care it needs. Here's a paper that goes into the details of the comparison between doing it yourself and utilizing a Solr-as-a-Service solution.

https://www.measuredsearch.com/white-papers/why-solr-service-is-better-than-diy-solr-infrastructure/

Full disclosure, I run product for Measured Search that offers Cloud Agnostic Solr-as-a-Service. Measured Search enables you to standup a Solr Cluster on Azure within minutes.

score 2 · Answer 3 · answered Feb 18 '16 at 18:01

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For the new visitor their is now two Solr instances available via . We tested them and they are good. But ended up using the Azure Search service which so far looks very solid.

answered Feb 18 '16 at 18:01

Chris Riley

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score 2 · Answer 4 · edited Jul 27 '21 at 06:04

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I haven't actually tried, but Azure can run Java, so theoretically it should be able to run Solr.

This article ("Run Java with Jetty in Windows Azure") should be useful.

The coordinator for "Lucene.Net on Azure" also claims it should run.

EDIT : The Microsoft Interop team has written a great guide and config tips for running Solr on Azure!

edited Jul 27 '21 at 06:04

Glorfindel

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answered Oct 02 '10 at 17:44

Mauricio Scheffer

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I was thinking since Solr store its index to a file. Does Azure support writing to a file? – HaavardMeling Oct 04 '10 at 19:15
@Håvard Meling: I think it does, look up "Azure local storage" – Mauricio Scheffer Oct 04 '10 at 21:44
After what I can see the local storage is only temporary to the lifetime of the instance. Which would mean it has to be rebuilt all the time. – HaavardMeling Oct 05 '10 at 21:28
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@MauricioScheffer Your link for the Solr on Azure guide is broken. – Rob Dec 20 '18 at 08:21

score 1 · Answer 5 · answered Feb 20 '15 at 19:01

Azure IaaS allows you to create linux based VMs, flavors including Ubuntu, SUSE and CentOS. This VM comes with local root storage that exists only for the VM is rebooted.

However, you can add additional volumes on which data will persist even through reboots. Your solr data can be stored here.

Running Solr on Azure

5 Answers5