Setting up TomCat 4.1.12 to run as an NT Service:
(Special thanks to Jacob K. for explaining this on the TomCat Users List)
Please send corrections/bugs/etc. to tomcat@mattkelli.com.

• Set NT environment variables:
  • CATALINA_HOME=C:\jakarta-tomcat-4.1.12
  • CATALINA_OPTS=-server -Xms128m -Xmx512m
• Open up a new command prompt (ensures environment variables you just added are active)
• Run the following (must be all one line so you may have to put in notepad and then copy -- copy from this page should work OK):
  %CATALINA_HOME%\bin\tomcat.exe -install Apache-Catalina %JAVA_HOME%\jre\bin\server\jvm.dll -Djava.class.path=%CATALINA_HOME%\bin\bootstrap.jar;%JAVA_HOME%\lib\tools.jar -Dcatalina.home=%CATALINA_HOME% %CATALINA_OPTS% -Xrs -start org.apache.catalina.startup.BootstrapService -params start -stop org.apache.catalina.startup.BootstrapService -params stop -out %CATALINA_HOME%\logs\stdout.log -err %CATALINA_HOME%\logs\stderr.log
• To Uninstall Catalina Service use:
  %CATALINA_HOME%\bin\tomcat.exe -uninstall Apache-Catalina
• You should get a message saying that the task was installed successfully.
• The service is called Apache-Catalina (can change name either in command above or from windows services list (right-click to get properties)

Note: I checked to see if the service would close (a problem that was known to occur with TomCat 3.x and JDK 1.3.1) when logging out of Windows. For my config (Win2K, TomCat 4.1.12, JDK 1.4.0_01) it did stay open so that's good.

Note: don't forget in the future that you have TomCat always running on this machine -- so if you do something like try to launch JBoss with its TomCat for some testing there will be a conflict (I just added a message and pause statement at the top of my run.bat for JBoss to remind myself to first stop this service).

Disclaimer:

I'm just a developer (not employed by any party mentioned in this document) who uses these products and so wrote this document for my own notes then decided to put it out for any interested parties.

The information in this document was created using the following configuration:

• Windows 2000 Professional
• TomCat 4.1.12
• j2sdk1.4.0_01

The document is presented "as is" with no warranty. I tested this on my system with the configuration noted above. Naturally I can not guarantee it and can not be responsible for anything that results from your use of it.