Tomcat 7 startup.bat opens in new window

[Rabindranath Bustos]

Hello. I'm new to deploying in tomcat, and I'm facing some problems trying to install tomcat 7 in a Windows computer.

I could install and start tomcat without problems (the zip distribution from apache.org). However, due to some requirements I can't start it as a service.

I read in a lot of places that I can start it with >catalina start, which would start apache in the background and redirect the output to the log files. However, what's happening is that it starts the server in a new window, and the output is printed to console and not saved to any log file.

I would like to know if I'm missing some additional configuration, or any tips on the subject.

Regards,

Rabindranath

[Tim Holloway]

Welcome to the JavaRanch, Rabindranath!

Tomcat's console is not actually a log file, just the stdout and stderr output from the Tomcat JVM. The stock scripts for running Tomcat usually redirect it to catalina.out, but that's just a convention and not actually an architectural constraint. Which is one reason why we tell people that webapps should do system.out.println - you never know where the print output may be sent.

So you should be able to create a "log file" by starting Tomcat with a "catalina start >C:\TOMCAT_HOME\logs\catalina.out" (adjust path to fit your preferences). Since the pop-up window is provided by Windows, if you redirect both stdout and stderr ("2>"), Windows shouldn't pop up that second window, since it's only provided when a stdio output needs a place to present itself.

There are other ways of running commands in Windows that avoid the second window as well, but I'm out of practice on them.

[Rabindranath Bustos]

Thanks for your response.

I've already tried to redirect stdout and stderr but it doesn't work. I also tried to edit the catalina.bat file itself and add the redirection parameters right at the command invocation but the result is the same: the additional window keeps poping up with all the output being shown there and the log files are left empty.

Btw, I do use log4j as logging framework, but just using the console appender because I want to see the output in eclipse and no log files while in development and didn't wanted to have to change the configuration specifically for production, so I assumed that the appserver would take care of the redirection. I'm open for suggestions if there are alternative ways to achieve that (log output in console for development but to a file in production).

Thanks in advance.

[William Brogden]

I don't know about Tomcat 7, but the Tomcat 6 catalina.bat contains the following:

echo Usage:  catalina ( commands ... )
echo commands:
echo   debug             Start Catalina in a debugger
echo   debug -security   Debug Catalina with a security manager
echo   jpda start        Start Catalina under JPDA debugger
echo   run               Start Catalina in the current window
echo   run -security     Start in the current window with security manager
echo   start             Start Catalina in a separate window
echo   start -security   Start in a separate window with security manager
echo   stop              Stop Catalina
echo   version           What version of tomcat are you running?
goto end

SO - it looks like using "start" is what causes the new window, I suggest you try "run"

Bill

[Rabindranath Bustos]

Thanks, that did the trick.