Configuring contentstore and SOLR indices in Alfresco 5

Cesar Capillas

In an Alfresco setup, we find important directories under
alf_data (dir.root) in a default installation :

/opt/alfresco51e
/opt/alfresco51e/alf_data
  contentstore         --> Alfresco binaries are located here 
  contentstore.deleted --> Alfresco binaries at the final of the deletion lifecycle
  solr4Backup          --> Alfresco Backups for SOLR indices (3 snapshots)
  solr4                --> SOLR indices

In most cases, these directories are reconfigured:

contentstore is a large scalable remote NFS drive, which is better
mounted out of alf_data directory
contentstore.deleted may be deleted periodically via cron job safely
solr4 indices should be in the fastest disk as possible for better
perfomance indexing and searching
solr4 indices folder should not be copied in a hot backup procedure

For example, a more suitable directory structure may be something
like this:

/opt/alfresco51e
/opt/data
  contentstore
  contentstore.deleted
/opt/solr4Backup
/opt/solr4

where /opt/data is usually a NFS mount point, and /opt/solr4 a faster
local disk. For this new setup, we have to make some changes in
Alfresco configuration according to:
In
alfresco-global.properties: (in /opt/alfresco51e/tomcat/shared/classes)

dir.root=/opt/alfresco51e/alf_data

# Contentstore
dir.contentstore=/opt/data/contentstore
dir.contentstore.deleted=/opt/data/contentstore.deleted

# Backup indices
solr.backup.archive.remoteBackupLocation=/opt/solr4Backup/archive
solr.backup.alfresco.remoteBackupLocation=/opt/solr4Backup/alfresco

Besides, we need to modify data.dir.root variable in both solrcore.properties

/opt/alfresco51e/solr4/archive-SpacesStore/conf/solrcore.properties
/opt/alfresco51e/solr4/workspace-SpacesStore/conf/solrcore.properties

#data.dir.root=/opt/alfresco51e/alf_data/solr4/index
data.dir.root=/opt/solr4/index

And finally in /opt/alfresco51e/tomcat/conf/Catalina/localhost/solr4.xml

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<Context debug="0" crossContext="true">
  <Environment name="solr/home"        type="java.lang.String" value="/opt/alfresco51e/solr4" override="true"/>
<!--
  <Environment name="solr/model/dir"   type="java.lang.String" value="/opt/alfresco51e/alf_data/solr4/model" override="true"/>
  <Environment name="solr/content/dir" type="java.lang.String" value="/opt/alfresco51e/alf_data/solr4/content" override="true"/>
-->
  <Environment name="solr/model/dir"   type="java.lang.String" value="/opt/solr4/model" override="true"/>
  <Environment name="solr/content/dir" type="java.lang.String" value="/opt/solr4/content" override="true"/>
</Context>

With this configuration, we can make for example easier hot backups
at 5:30 AM for the new paths,

/opt/solr4Backup       --> backups by default at 2 AM and 4 AM
/opt/data/contentstore --> better an incremental or differential backup 
/opt/alfresco51e       --> tomcat config. & modules

with the corresponding dump for the database.

Notes: