Java SDK
You can get Java SDK from SUN site (http://java.sun.com). It's recommended the J2SE 1.5 version. The installation is very simples, just click on the executable file and press "next" button until the end of the process.
When the install process over, you must create the JAVA_HOME environment variable. To do this on Windows, click on Start menu, Settings, Control Panel. A new windows will be opened, then click on System icon. Go to Advanced tab and after you click on Environment Variables button. There you can create the JAVA_HOME variable, this one need to point to the J2SE directory, e.g.: c:\Program file\Java\jdk1.5.0_01. On Linux the process is similar, instead the System icon, you need to put the path into .profile file.
Application Server
Any java application server will works with JTasks. We recommend the Tomcat (http://jakarta.apache.org/tomcat/) , it's a simple servlet-container and will work fine with JTasks, by the way, JTasks is developed and tested with Tomcat. There is an excellent document in tomcat web-site, but to make your life easier, I will try to explain how to install it in little words.
At first, you need to get the .zip file in the tomcat website. After that, you can extract the file in any directory, c:\program file\jakarta-tomcat, I will use it in the rest of the example.
Now, you must create three environment variable (like the Java SDK). The variable's names are: TOMCAT_HOME, CATALINA_HOME, CATALINA_BASE. These three variables must point to the same local, c:\program file\jakarta-tomcat. Finally, the tomcat is ready to run.
Up to now, your Java SDK and Tomcat are installed. To test it, you can double click in the startup.bat file inside c:\program file\jakarta-tomcat\bin. A prompt will open and a lot of words will show. At the final, one line written "Server Startup" must show, after that, try to put this link in your browser, http://localhost:8080, a tomcat page must show for you.
Database
JTasks works with a lot of kind databases. We recommend that you use mySQL (http://www.mysql.com), but if you prefer other, such as: Firebird, Oracle, DB2, MSSql, and so on, no problem, JTasks goes works perfectly. To install your database, please consult its documentation.
After you get the JTasks.zip file, you must extract it into webapps directory from your Application Server. To tomcat users, you can try to find this directory inside the c:/program files/Jakarta-tomcat/webapps. Finally, a new directory will be created, called jtasks (in lowercase). Your software is almost ready to run, however you need to configure the database options. To do this, follow the instructions:
- open the hibernate.cfg.xml file, it's localized inside jtasks/WEB-INF/classes directory.
- If you are using mySQL database, you go change 3 tags: connection.username, connection.url, connection.password. If you are using different database than mySQL, you need also change dialect(see hibernate doc http://www.hibernate.org/hib_docs/v3/reference/en/html/session-configuration.html#configuration-optional-dialects), connection.driver_class (also put the database jar file inside the WEB-INF/lib directory).
- Make sure that hbm2ddl.auto is set up to create.
Now, your JTask system is ready to run. Click on startup.bat file inside the tomcat/bin directory and wait the application server start. After that, you can try to enter in the software using your internet browser, putting this url: http://localhost:8080/jtasks
A wizard page must appear for you.
Attention: after you finish the wizard, stop the server (closing the prompt). Go to hibernate.cfg.xml file again, and change the hbm2ddl.auto property to update. If you leave "create", all time that you RUN your application server, hibernate goes drop and create the tables again, thus you never will have datas.