Creating and Deploying to WebLogic Server Clusters

Tutorial 1: Creating a WebLogic Server Cluster

In this tutorial you use the WebLogic Server Configuration Wizard to create the domain, servers, and cluster in which you will deploy and run the MedRec applications. The new domain, medrecdomain, contains a single Administration Server and a cluster of three Managed Servers.

The tutorial includes the following sections:

Prerequisites

Before starting this tutorial, make sure WebLogic Server and the server samples are installed on your computer.

Procedure

To create the domains server instances, and clusters:

Start the Configuration Wizard on your system by selecting the Start Menu option:

Start—>Programs—>BEA WebLogic Platform 8.1—>Configuration Wizard
On the initial screen, select Create a new WebLogic configuration.
On the Select a Configuration Template screen, select the Basic WebLogic Server Domain template.
Note: Do not select the Avitek Medical Records Sample Domain template, as the tutorial does not make use of its functionality.

On the Choose Express or Custom Configuration screen, select Custom and click Next..
On the Configure the Administration Server screen:
On the Managed Servers, Clusters, and Machines Options screen, select Yes and click Next to continue..
On the Configure Managed Servers screen, click Add and:
On the Configure Clusters screen, click Add and:
In the Assign Servers to Clusters screen:
On the Configure Machines screen, click Next without adding any machines.
On the Database (JDBC) Options screen, click Next.
On the Messaging (JMS) Options screen, click Next.
On the Configure Administrative Username and Password screen:
On the Configure Windows Options screen:
On the Configure Server Start Mode and Java SDK screen:
- Select Development Mode in the WebLogic Configuration Startup Mode section.
- Click Next to continue.
On the Create WebLogic Configuration screen:
The Configuration Wizard creates the new domain in c:\bea\user_projects\domains\MedRecClusterDomain.

Name	ListenAddress	ListenPort
MedRec2	127.0.0.1	8011
MedRec3	127.0.0.1	8021

Best Practices

When creating the clustered WebLogic Server instances on a single machine, specify an unused localhost port such as 127.0.0.1 for the Listen Address. If you leave the Listen Address field blank, the server binds to all available IP addresses on the machine. If you specify "localhost" as the Listen Address, the server binds to all localhost addresses (127.0.0.x).
Always specify an unused Multicast address and port number for production clusters. This ensures that only the cluster's messages are broadcast on the address/port combination.

The Big Picture

This tutorial is the basis for setting up your cluster environment. Before you can deploy applications to a server, you must first configure the domains and servers to which you want to deploy the applications.

The servers that you created have a minimal configuration—you specified only the server names and listen address, and their membership in the cluster. In the next tutorial, you will use the Administration Console to create and assign the server resources necessary to deploy the MedRec application suite on the cluster.