importApplicationManifest

importApplicationManifest( <applicationManifestFilename> [, <variables> [, <listener>, [, <manifestPath>] ] ] )

Imports application manifest and assures that the application is installed with provided options. The application may be installed, updated or no action may be performed if the application is up to date.

The idea behind manifests is described on a page dedicated to manifests.

The importApplicationManifest function:

• parses the input manifest file
• substitutes variable references with their values
• for each application listed in the manifest, it calculates checksum of application deployment options and the actual application archive
• checksums are being compared with checksums saved in configuration during previous deployment
• if the application has not been deployed yet, it is being installed
• if the application was deployed before and checksums do not match the ones stored in configuration, the application is being updated
• if the application was deployed before and checksums in WAS configuration match checksums calculated above, the install/update step is being skipped
• if application was installed/updated, its manifest & EAR checksum is being saved in WAS configuration as custom property of the deployment

Arguments

applicationManifestFilename

path to application manifest file, relative to manifestPath

variables

dictionary of variables (and filters) being used during variable expansion

listener

listener objects receiving callbacks on different actions being performed during application manifest import

manifestPath

list of paths where the applicationManifestFile is going to be looked up; optional, defaults to reversed Jython’s sys.path

Result

List of application names that have been affected (installed or updated) during manifest import. Application manifest may describe deployment of one or more applications. Names of applications which haven’t been installed/updated will not be included in the returned list.

Result

List of application names installed or updated during manifest processing.

Notes

Idempotency of importApplicationManifest function relies on value of wdr.checksum custom property being added to Deployment/ApplicationDeployment object after successful install/update operation. The wdr.checksum property is visible in AdminConsole from version 8.0 of WebSphere Application Server. Regardless of product version, it is always possible to access it via scrtipt:

appName = 'DefaultApplication'
checksums = getid1('/Deployment:%s/ApplicationDeployment:/Property:wdr.checksum/' % appName).value

print 'Checksum of %s is %s' % (appName, checksums)

The value of wdr.checksum consists of checksum of application binary and checksum of manifest file, which means that after change of any of these 2 files and invoking importApplicationManifest again, the application will be updated.

When installing/updating the application via AdminConsole or via wsadmin’s insta/update functions, the wdr.checksum will not updated. Therefore mixing manual or AdminApp-based installs/updates with importApplicationManifest usage may break imdepotency of importApplicationManifest function.

Generally, manual deployments are only recommended when the structure of the application has changed, the changes need to be reflected in the manifest and your preferred way of authoring application manifests is via customising manifests generated by exportApplicationManifestToFile function. Then the sequence is:

• install manually
• export application manifest
• customise manifest for your environment
• reinstall again by importing the manifest

Examples

The example demonstrates installing or updating the DefaultApplication provided with WebSphere Application Server.

The application manifest may look as follows:

DefaultApplication ../applications/DefaultApplication.ear
 DataSourceFor20CMPBeans
  Increment EJB module;Increment;Increment.jar,META-INF/ejb-jar.xml;jdbc/DefaultEJBTimerDataSource;cmpBinding.perConnectionFactory;;
 DataSourceFor20EJBModules
  Increment EJB module;Increment.jar,META-INF/ejb-jar.xml;jdbc/DefaultEJBTimerDataSource;cmpBinding.perConnectionFactory;;;
 MapModulesToServers
  Increment EJB module;Increment.jar,META-INF/ejb-jar.xml;$[deploymentTargets]
  Default Web Application;DefaultWebApplication.war,WEB-INF/web.xml;$[deploymentTargets]+$[webServers]
 MapRolesToUsers
  All Role;AppDeploymentOption.No;AppDeploymentOption.No;;;AppDeploymentOption.Yes;;
 MapWebModToVH
  Default Web Application;DefaultWebApplication.war,WEB-INF/web.xml;$[virtualHost]
 asyncRequestDispatchType DISABLED
 createMBeansForResources 
 distributeApp 
 filepermission .*\.dll=755#.*\.so=755#.*\.a=755#.*\.sl=755
 noallowDispatchRemoteInclude 
 noallowServiceRemoteInclude 
 noprocessEmbeddedConfig 
 noreloadEnabled 
 nouseAutoLink 
 nouseMetaDataFromBinary 
 nodeployws 
 nodeployejb 
 nopreCompileJSPs 
 validateinstall warn

The first line in the manifest above defines application name (as it is visible in AdminConsole) and path to application archive (EAR, WAR, ejb-JAR). The path is relative to manifest file (not current working directory nor manifestPath).

The remaining lines represent options being passed to AdminApp install/update functions.

Please note references to $[deploymentTargets], $[webServers] and $[virtualHost] variable references.

The actual values of these variables are being passed as a dictionary to importApplicationManifest call.

The VerboseListener object will receive callbacks on events that occur during manifest processing.

Lastly, a manifestPath list is being passed to importApplicationManifest which will instruct the import process to search for application manifest in manifests directory. Considering the fact that the manifest points to ../applications/DefaultApplication.ear binary, the directory structure must look as follows:

importApplicationManifestExample.py
manifests/DefaultApplication.wdra
applications/DefaultApplication.ear

# importApplicationManifestExample.py

class VerboseListener( ApplicationDeploymentListener ):
    def beforeInstall( self, appName, archivePath ):
        print 'about to install application %s from %s' % (appName, archivePath)
    def beforeUpdate( self, appName, archivePath ):
        print 'about to update application %s from %s' % (appName, archivePath)
    def afterInstall( self, appName, archivePath ):
        print 'installed application %s from %s' % (appName, archivePath)
    def afterUpdate( self, appName, archivePath ):
        print 'updated application %s from %s' % (appName, archivePath)
    def skippedUpdate( self, appName, archivePath ):
        print 'skipped application installation/update of %s from %s' % (appName, archivePath)

# these environment-specific values should be loaded from external file/script:
cellName = 'wdrCell'
clusterName = 'wdrCluster'
webServers = [ [ 'webServerNode01', 'webServer01' ], [ 'webServerNode02', 'webServer02' ] ]
virtualHost = 'wdr_host'
try:
    variables = {}
    variables['virtualHost'] = virtualHost
    # store 'WebSphere:cell=wdrCell,cluster=wdrCluster' under 'deploymentTargets' key
    variables[ 'deploymentTargets' ] = 'WebSphere:cell=%s,cluster=%s' % ( cellName, clusterName )
    # the following line will store 'webServers' entry with value of:
    # 'WebSphere:node=webServerNode01,server=webServer01+WebSphere:node=webServerNode02,server=webServer02'
    variables[ 'webServers' ] = '+'.join( [ 'WebSphere:node=%s,server=%s' % tuple(ws) for ws in webServers ] )
    importApplicationManifest('DefaultApplication.wdra', variables, VerboseListener(), ['manifests'])
    save()
    sync()
finally:
    reset()

See also

• importApplicationEmbeddedManifest
• exportApplicationManifestToFile