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Building a Java Web Environment on Alibaba Cloud ECS

A step-by-step guide to purchasing an Alibaba Cloud ECS instance and setting up a complete Java Web environment with JDK, MySQL, Tomcat, and Elasticsearch.

Building a Java Web Environment on Alibaba Cloud ECS

A step-by-step guide to purchasing an Alibaba Cloud ECS instance and setting up a complete Java Web environment with JDK, MySQL, Tomcat, and Elasticsearch.

Victory

Purchasing and Configuring an Alibaba Cloud ECS Instance

Alibaba Cloud ECS

Elastic Compute Service (ECS) is a scalable and high-performance cloud computing service that helps you quickly build secure and reliable applications while reducing operational costs and improving efficiency.

Choosing an ECS Instance

From the product homepage, navigate directly to the purchase page and select an instance that fits your needs. The main options include:

  • Billing method
  • Region (choose an overseas region if you need unrestricted network access)
  • Network (Classic Network vs VPC; Classic is simpler for personal use)
  • Instance type (CPU, memory configuration)
  • Bandwidth
  • Image (operating system)
  • Storage (default 40GB, expandable)
  • Security settings (SSH login password)

Network Configuration

After purchasing the ECS instance, you can view its details in the console. Pay attention to:

  1. Public IP and private IP (you will SSH via the public IP)
  2. Management options on the right panel

By default, accessing the server via public IP may fail:

telnet ip port

This happens because ECS security groups only open TCP ports 22 and 3389 by default, along with ICMP.

To allow access to web services, you must manually open ports 80, 443, or others such as 8080.

Official guide: Allow Public Access via HTTP/HTTPS

Setting Up the Java Web Environment

In this guide, we deploy the open-source e-commerce system Shopizer on the server.

Shopizer is a web-based e-commerce and sales management CMS that supports shopping carts, inventory management, payments, shipping, order tracking, and invoices.

System Environment

  • OS: CentOS 7 (64-bit)
  • Dependencies:
    • JDK
    • MySQL
    • Tomcat
    • Elasticsearch

Installing JDK

The simplest way is to install OpenJDK via yum.

Search for Java Packages

yum list java*

Install JDK 8 (64-bit)

yum install java-1.8.0-openjdk.x86_64

Verify Installation

java -version

Locate Installation Directory

whereis java

Installing and Starting MySQL

MySQL is not available directly via yum on CentOS 7, so we install it from the official repository.

Download and Install MySQL RPM

wget https://dev.mysql.com/get/mysql57-community-release-el7-11.noarch.rpm
rpm -ivh mysql57-community-release-el7-11.noarch.rpm
yum install mysql-community-server

Start MySQL

systemctl start mysqld.service

Retrieve Initial Root Password

cat /var/log/mysqld.log | grep "temporary password"

Login and Reset Password

mysql -p

You must reset the password before executing any commands:

ALTER USER 'root'@'localhost' IDENTIFIED BY 'yourpassword';
FLUSH PRIVILEGES;

Installing and Running Tomcat

We download the latest Tomcat version manually to ensure compatibility.

wget http://apache.fayea.com/tomcat/tomcat-8/v8.5.15/bin/apache-tomcat-8.5.15.zip
yum install unzip
unzip apache-tomcat-8.5.15.zip
cd apache-tomcat-8.5.15/bin
./startup.sh

Common Issue: Tomcat Stuck on Startup

If Tomcat hangs at:

Deploying web application directory ...

You may need to disable auto-deployment or adjust configuration as described in this article: Tomcat Startup Stuck Issue

Installing Elasticsearch

Shopizer uses Elasticsearch 2.x, so we install version 2.4.4.

Download and Extract

wget https://download.elastic.co/elasticsearch/release/org/elasticsearch/distribution/zip/elasticsearch/2.4.4/elasticsearch-2.4.4.zip
unzip elasticsearch-2.4.4.zip

Common Issues

1. Cannot Run as Root

Elasticsearch refuses to run as root by default.

2. Insufficient Memory

You may encounter memory allocation errors.

Temporary Solution

./elasticsearch -Des.insecure.allow.root=true -Xms256m -Xmx256m

⚠️ Note: Running Elasticsearch as root is not recommended for production. Always deploy it as a dedicated user with proper memory allocation.

Summary

With Alibaba Cloud ECS, you can quickly provision a server and deploy a full Java Web environment. This setup is suitable for personal projects, demos, and small-scale production systems.

Key takeaways:

  • Always configure security group ports explicitly
  • Use official repositories for critical components
  • Avoid running services as root in production
  • Monitor memory usage carefully on low-spec servers
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