Administering SAS Web Applications

Rebuilding the SAS Web Applications

When to Rebuild the SAS Web Applications

The Rebuild Web Applications feature of SAS Deployment Manager provides an automated way to rebuild the Web applications that are deployed in your environment. You should rebuild the Web applications in the following situations:

You might need to rebuild applications that you have reconfigured. For example, if you change the HTTP time-out interval for an application, then you should rebuild the application.

Note: This administration guide informs you when an application must be rebuilt after reconfiguration.
Rebuild an application after you change the application's Java security configuration.
If a custom theme is created for your organization, then rebuild the SAS Web Application Themes.
If custom content is created, then add files to the WAR directory and rebuild the application to which the custom content applies. For example, to create custom forms for SAS Stored Process, you place the file for the EAR or the WAR in the SAS-configuration-directory \Lev1\Web\Common\SASServer1\SASStoredProcess9.2\
CustomContent\ears\sas.storedprocess\input directory. Then, use the SAS Deployment Manager to rebuild the SAS Stored Process application.
If custom portal content, such as a custom portlet, is created for your organization, rebuild the SAS Information Delivery Portal. For more information, see Rebuild One or More Web Applications.
Rebuild SAS Help Viewer Metadata Configuration after your initial deployment if you later install or upgrade a SAS Web application that uses SAS Help Viewer Metadata Configuration. (SAS Help Viewer Metadata Configuration combines SAS Help Viewer for the Web software with various Help content into its EAR file.)

The following Web applications use SAS Help Viewer Metadata Configuration:
- SAS Information Delivery Portal Help
- SAS Web Report Studio Help
- SAS Web Report Viewer Help
- SAS BI Dashboard Help
- SAS Comment Manager Help
After installing the second maintenance release for SAS 9.2 or later, you must use the SAS Deployment Manager to rebuild the EAR files for all Web applications that were updated at your site. Because the EAR files are rebuilt, you might lose any customizations that you added to the EAR files after initial deployment. For more information, see Maintenance Planning for SAS 9.2.

Rebuild One or More Web Applications

In SAS 9.2, the Rebuild Web Applications option in the SAS Deployment Manager enables you to rebuild a subset of the EAR files. In the second maintenance release for SAS 9.2 and later, when you rebuild Web applications by using the SAS Deployment Manager, the EAR files for the Web applications are automatically placed in two directories:

SAS-configuration-directory\Lev1\Web\Staging. The approximate size of the collection of EAR files for EBI is 2 GB.
SAS-configuration-directory\Lev1\Web\Staging\exploded. The approximate size of the Exploded directory is 2 GB. The size of the Exploded directory is similar to the size of the EAR files in the SAS-configuration-directory\Lev1\Web\Staging directory.

In the second maintenance release for SAS 9.2 and later, the exploded EAR files are always recreated whenever you rebuild Web applications in the SAS Deployment Manager. Previously, in SAS 9.2, this was not the case.

Note: If you are using the second maintenance release for SAS 9.2 or later, and you want to save disk space, you can delete the unwanted directories below the SAS-configuration-directory\Lev1\Web\Staging\exploded directory. However, if you are using WebLogic as your Web application server, do not delete the exploded copy of the sas.wip.services9.2 EAR file. [cautionend]

To rebuild one or more Web applications, follow these steps:

Verify the status of the Web application server.
- Shut down the JBoss application server. This is required because the SAS Deployment Manager modifies the existing configuration for JBoss when it rebuilds the Web applications.
- The WebLogic Administration Server and Node Manager must be running when you rebuild Web applications.
- Shut down the WebSphere application server, but leave the dmgr and nodeagent running.
Make sure that the SAS Metadata Server is running.
In Windows, access the SAS Deployment Manager by running the config.exe file in the SAS-installation-directory\SASDeploymentManager\9.2 directory. In a UNIX or z/OS environment, run the config.sh file.
Select the Rebuild Web Applications option and click Next.
In the next dialog box, specify the configuration directory and the level (for example, Lev1) in which you want to rebuild the applications.
In the next dialog box, enter the user ID and password for an unrestricted administrative user (for example, sasadm@saspw).
In the next dialog box, select the check boxes for the applications that you want to rebuild.
In the next dialog box, click Start to start the rebuild. The SAS Deployment Manager builds the EAR files for the selected applications. For the names and location of the EAR files, see Names of the EAR Files.
Deploy the EAR files to the Web application server. See Redeploying the SAS Web Applications.
If you are rebuilding theme content, you might need to stop and restart the Web application server as follows:
- If SAS Web Application Themes is deployed as an EAR in a Web application server, then the first time a custom theme is deployed, the Web application server must be stopped and restarted. Any subsequent modifications to the custom theme do not require a restart of the Web application server unless the theme descriptors have been changed.
- If SAS Web Application Themes is exploded and deployed in an HTTP server (such as Apache HTTP Server), then the Web application server does not need to be restarted based on any theme changes.
For all other Web applications, you do not need to stop and restart the Web application server.

Names of the EAR Files

When the Web applications are rebuilt, the SAS Deployment Manager places the EAR files in the following directories: SAS-configuration-directory\Lev1\Web\Staging and SAS-configuration-directory\Lev1\Web\Staging\exploded directory.

Depending on the software that you have installed, the following EAR files are available:

List of EAR Files
Application	EAR File
SAS BI Dashboard	sas.bidashboard4.3.ear
SAS BI Portlets (table note 1)	sas.biportlets4.3.ear
SAS Package Viewer (ships with SAS Information Delivery Portal)	sas.packageviewer4.3.ear
SAS Information Delivery Portal	sas.portal4.3.ear
SAS Shared Services	sas.shared9.2.ear
SAS Stored Process	sas.storedprocess9.2.ear
SAS Web Application Themes	sas.themes.ear
SAS Flex Application Themes	sas.flexthemes.ear
SAS Help Viewer Metadata Configuration	sas.webdocmd9.2.ear
SAS Web Report Studio	sas.webreportstudio4.3.ear
SAS Web Infrastructure Platform Applications	sas.wip.apps9.2.ear
SAS Content Server	sas.wip.scs9.2.ear
SAS Web Infrastructure Platform Services	sas.wip.services9.2.ear

TABLE NOTE 1: Available in the October 2009 Release and later.

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