In this tutorial, we will discuss how to install Apache Tomcat 9 on

RHEL 8 / CentOS 8. Apache Tomcat is an open-source Java-capable

HTTP server developed by the Apache Software Foundation. It is used
to execute special Java programs known as “Java Servlet” and “Java
Server Pages (JSP)“.

Apache Tomcat 9 support:

 Java Servlet 4.0

 JavaServer Pages 2.4

 Java Unified Expression Language 3.1

 and Java API for WebSocket 2.0 specifications.

The major dependency of Apache Tomcat 9.0.x is Java 8 or later. So
this dependency will need to be installed before you download and
install Tomcat Server.

For Debian: Install Tomcat 9 on Debian with Ansible

Apache Tomcat 9 on CentOS 8|RHEL 8|Rocky

Linux 8
We will do the manual installation which works best for users new to
Linux. The steps required to have working Tomcat 9 server installation
on RHEL / CentOS 8 are:

Step 1: Install Java on CentOS 8|RHEL 8|Rocky Linux 8

Use our guide below to install Java on RHEL / CentOS server.

 Install Java 11 (OpenJDK 11) on RHEL / CentOS 8

Confirm Java installation was successful
$ java -version

java version "11.0.15.1" 2022-04-22 LTS

Java(TM) SE Runtime Environment 18.9 (build 11.0.15.1+2-LTS-10)

Java HotSpot(TM) 64-Bit Server VM 18.9 (build 11.0.15.1+2-LTS-10, mixed

mode)

Step 2: Create tomcat user and group

We nee to add user dedicated to running tomcat service.

sudo groupadd --system tomcat

sudo useradd -d /usr/share/tomcat -r -s /bin/false -g tomcat tomcat

Step 3: Install Tomcat 9 on Linux CentOS 8|RHEL 8|Rocky

Linux 8
Check the latest release version of Tomcat 9. Save the version number
to VER variable and proceed to download.

sudo yum -y install wget

export VER="9.0.64"

wget https://archive.apache.org/dist/tomcat/tomcat-9/v${VER}/bin/apache-
tomcat-${VER}.tar.gz
Extract downloaded file with tar.

sudo tar xvf apache-tomcat-${VER}.tar.gz -C /usr/share/

Create symlink to extracted tomcat data.
sudo ln -s /usr/share/apache-tomcat-$VER/ /usr/share/tomcat
If you download a newer version of Tomcat, just update the symbolic
link to the new version folder.

Set proper directory permissions.

sudo chown -R tomcat:tomcat /usr/share/tomcat

sudo chown -R tomcat:tomcat /usr/share/apache-tomcat-$VER/

The /usr/share/tomcat directory has the following sub-directories:

 bin: contains
the binaries and scripts (e.g startup.sh and shutdown.sh f
or Unixes and Mac OS X).

 conf: contains the system-wide configuration files,

such as server.xml, web.xml, and context.xml.

 webapps: contains the webapps to be deployed. You can also

place the WAR (Webapp Archive) file for deployment here.

 lib: contains the Tomcat’s system-wide library JAR files,

accessible by all webapps. You could also place external JAR
file (such as MySQL JDBC Driver) here.

 logs: contains Tomcat’s log files. You may need to check for
error messages here.

 work: Tomcat’s working directory used by JSP, for JSP-to-

Servlet conversion.

Step 4: Configure Tomcat 9 Systemd service

Create a new systemd service to Tomcat.

sudo vim /etc/systemd/system/tomcat.service
With below configuration:

[Unit]

Description=Tomcat

After=syslog.target network.target

[Service]

Type=forking

User=tomcat

Group=tomcat

Environment=JAVA_HOME=/usr/lib/jvm/jre-openjdk

Environment='JAVA_OPTS=-Djava.awt.headless=true'

Environment=CATALINA_HOME=/usr/share/tomcat

Environment=CATALINA_BASE=/usr/share/tomcat

Environment=CATALINA_PID=/usr/share/tomcat/temp/tomcat.pid
ExecStart=/usr/share/tomcat/bin/catalina.sh start

ExecStop=/usr/share/tomcat/bin/catalina.sh stop

[Install]

WantedBy=multi-user.target
Update CATALINA_OPTS values with your memory limits for Tomcat
service.

Start and enable service.

sudo systemctl daemon-reload

sudo systemctl restart tomcat

sudo systemctl enable tomcat

Check service status with the following command:

$ systemctl status tomcat

● tomcat.service - Tomcat

    Loaded: loaded (/etc/systemd/system/tomcat.service; disabled; vendor preset:

disabled)

    Active: active (running) since Sat 2018-12-29 11:18:44 EAT; 29s ago
   Process: 31508 ExecStart=/usr/share/tomcat/bin/catalina.sh start (code=exited,
status=0/SUCCESS)

  Main PID: 31514 (java)

     Tasks: 50 (limit: 11510)

    Memory: 92.2M

    CGroup: /system.slice/tomcat.service

            └─31514 /usr/lib/jvm/jre/bin/java

-Djava.util.logging.config.file=/usr/share/tomcat/conf/logging.properties -
Djava.util.logging.manager=org>

Dec 29 11:18:44 rhel8.local systemd[1]: Starting Tomcat…

Dec 29 11:18:44 rhel8.local systemd[1]: Started Tomcat.

Step 5: Configure Firewall

Allow Port used by tomcat on the firewall – TCP port 8080.

sudo firewall-cmd --permanent --add-port=8080/tcp

sudo firewall-cmd --reload

Step 6: Configure Tomcat Authentication

To this point, you have done a great work of installing and configuring
Tomcat. The missing piece is configuration of users which are used to
access Tomcat web management interface.
Edit the users configuration file:

sudo vi /usr/share/tomcat/conf/tomcat-users.xml
Add below line before </tomcat-users>

<role rolename="admin-gui"/>

<role rolename="manager-gui"/>

<user username="admin" password="MyStrongPassword"

fullName="Administrator" roles="admin-gui,manager-gui"/>
Replace MyStrongPassword with your desired admin password. See
below
Step 7: Configure Tomcat Proxy

We will use Apache httpd as a proxy to an Apache Tomcat application

container. Install httpd package using command below.

sudo yum -y install httpd

Create VirtualHost for accessing Tomcat Admin web interface
– /etc/httpd/conf.d/tomcat_manager.conf

<VirtualHost *:80>
    ServerAdmin root@localhost

    ServerName tomcat.example.com

    DefaultType text/html

    ProxyRequests off

    ProxyPreserveHost On

    ProxyPass / http://localhost:8080/

    ProxyPassReverse / http://localhost:8080/

</VirtualHost>
tomcat.example.com should be value of your tomcat server name.

For AJP connector, it will be configuration like this:

<VirtualHost *:80>

  ServerName example.com

  ProxyRequests Off

  ProxyPass / ajp://localhost:8009/

  ProxyPassReverse / ajp://localhost:8009/

</VirtualHost>
Configure SELinux for Apache to access Tomcat.
sudo setsebool -P httpd_can_network_connect 1

sudo setsebool -P httpd_can_network_relay 1

sudo setsebool -P httpd_graceful_shutdown 1

sudo setsebool -P nis_enabled 1

Restart httpd service

sudo systemctl restart httpd && sudo systemctl enable httpd

Step 8: Access Tomcat Web interface

Use your domain name configured on VirtualHost to access Tomcat

management interface.