Deploy Application war file to Tomcat Using Jenkins in 9 Simple Steps

Table of Contents

What is Tomcat

Apache tomcat is a free and open source Java based web server which provides an environment to run Java applications, Servlet and JSP Pages. Resources in tomcat web server can accessed through http or https based requests.

What is Jenkins

Jenkins is an open source automation server used for building, testing and deploying software in multiple environments with the help of supported frameworks and Libraries. It is a server based system that runs in servlet containers such as Apache Tomcat.

Step by Step Guide to Deploy Application war file to Tomcat Using Jenkins

Below are the steps to deploy a war file on tomcat server. war file can be stored on any repository or can be generated when building the application. The most easy way to demonstrate this is to download an existing sample war file and do the deployment. We have already done the tomcat and Jenkins setup on our windows machine. This machine is hosted in Microsoft Azure environment.

Step 1: Prerequisites

a) You should have a running Windows Server.

b) You should have Jenkins Installed on your Windows machine.

c) You should have access to deploy the application war file to tomcat server.

Step 2: Start Jenkins

Since the tomcat and Jenkins setup exist on same machine, we will use different ports to run each application. Let’s launch Jenkins on Port 9090.

Switch to the directory where Jenkins.war file is placed. In our case we have kept our files in “C:\Users\cyberithub\Desktop\jenkins>” directory.

05/05/2021  07:46 PM    <DIR>          .
05/05/2021  07:46 PM    <DIR>          ..
05/05/2021  07:43 PM        70,887,043 jenkins.war

In CMD, type command "java -jar jenkins.war --httpPort=9090" to launch Jenkins on Port 9090
Once started you should be able to see the Jenkins Login page as shown below.

Here you need to Login using your credential.

Step 3: Start Tomcat

Let’s start the tomcat on default port which is 8080. Though it can be launched on any port.

In CMD, switch to the directory where tomcat is installed and then go to bin directory.

"C:\Users\cyberithub\Desktop\tomcat\apache-tomcat-8.5.61\bin"

execute command "bat" to start Tomcat Server.
Once started you should be able to see the Tomcat Home Page as shown below.

Now that both the application is up and running, Let’s move in to next step.

Step 4: Install Deploy plugin in Jenkins

Go to Manage Jenkins -> Manage Plugins -> Available
Search for Deploy Container plugin and download
Create new item “DeployJob” as free style project.

Step 6: Add User In tomcat-users.xml

Go to the Tomcat conf directory.

C:\Users\cyberithub\Desktop\tomcat\apache-tomcat-8.5.61\conf

Inside it edit the file tomcat-users.xml and add a user name deploy with password deploy as shown below.

<user username="deploy" password="deploy" roles="manager-script"/>

Do not forget to specify role as "manager-script" so that user has the deployment rights.

Step 7: Download war File

Download sample war file from https://tomcat.apache.org/tomcat-7.0-doc/appdev/sample/
Place it in your Jenkins's workspace of above created project .

Step 8: Configure Project

Go to DeployJob -> Configure -> Build
Click on “Add post-build action” and select Deploy war/ear to a container from dropdown
Click on “Add Container” and select Tomcat 7.x Remote.(select based on your setup and requirement)
Add credential same as what has been added in tomcat-users.xml . Add other details as shown below and save the file.

**/*.war will pick the war file from our current workspace. click on ? to know more about this options.
Once configuration is done, Build the project. If configuration is done properly, build will pass and it will deploy the war file on tomcat.
Check the build status under "console output" option.

Step 9: Check The Deployment

Now check the deployment on tomcat using URL http://localhost:8080/sample.war/

Cyberithub