🔗 Integrate Apache Web Server and Oracle Weblogic Application Server

In this interesting post, we will discuss how to integrate Oracle WebLogic Application Server with Apache Web (HTTP) Server in a detailed manner.

What is the Main Use of Oracle WebLogic Web Server Plugins?

1. Oracle WebLogic Web Server Plug-Ins are plugins for popular Web Servers like Apache HTTP Server, iPlanet Web Server, Microsoft Internet Information Server (IIS).
2. This plugin diverts the incoming HTTP(s) requests within the Web Server and reverse proxies the incoming requests across WebLogic Server Clusters.

Prerequisites

1. Download and Install Apache Web Server (2.2)
2. Download and Install Oracle WebLogic Server 12c
3. Download Oracle WebLogic Web Server Plugins
4. Deploy some sample Web Applications to the application server cluster environments

Steps Involved

Step 1: Download the Oracle WebLogic Web Server Plugin

Download the Oracle WebLogic Web Server plugin from the Oracle website.

Step 2: Extract the Plugin Archive

Unzip the plugin downloaded. This archived file has plugins for all platforms (Linux, Solaris, AIX, HP-UX, Windows). Select the desired platform based on your needs. I'm using Apache Web Server which is running on a Linux machine, so the following is the desired plugin I'm looking for:

WLSPlugin12c-64bit-Apache2.2-Linux64-x86_64.zip

Step 3: Extract Platform-Specific Plugin

Now unarchive the WLSPlugin12c-64bit-Apache2.2-Linux64-x86_64.zip file.

Step 4: Copy Plugin Files to Apache

Copy the mod_wl.so to the modules folder of the Apache web server.

cp mod_wl.so /usr/local/apache2/modules/

Step 5: Copy Oracle Libraries

Copy the libclntsh.so and libnnz11.so files to the lib folder of the Apache web server.

cp libclntsh.so /usr/local/apache2/lib/
cp libnnz11.so /usr/local/apache2/lib/

Step 6: Configure Apache Web Server

The plugin installation setup part is done. Now we need to proceed with the configuration part:

• Load the mod_wl.so module to the Apache Web Server
• Set all the required web server parameters
• Get the application servers IP Address and Port numbers

Applications are deployed to the 3 managed servers mentioned above. So now specify that in theWebLogicCluster parameters list as 192.168.56.1:7001,192.168.56.1:4003 and192.168.56.1:4005. Use the same Context root (/Monitoring_Application) that we mentioned in application.xml deployment descriptors in the <Location> tag.

Step 7: Create Plugin Configuration File

Create a mod_wl.conf file with the following configuration:

LoadModule weblogic_module modules/mod_wl.so

<Location /Monitoring_Application>
    SetHandler weblogic-handler
    WebLogicCluster 192.168.56.1:7001,192.168.56.1:4003,192.168.56.1:4005
    Debug ON
    WLLogFile /usr/local/apache2/logs/weblogic.log
</Location>

<Location /Monitoring_Application/*>
    SetHandler weblogic-handler
    WebLogicCluster 192.168.56.1:7001,192.168.56.1:4003,192.168.56.1:4005
    Debug ON
    WLLogFile /usr/local/apache2/logs/weblogic.log
</Location>

Step 8: Include Plugin Configuration in Apache

Include the mod_wl.conf in the main Apache httpd.conf file.

# Include WebLogic plugin configuration
Include conf/mod_wl.conf

Step 9: Restart Apache Web Server

In order for the changes to take effect, restart the Apache web server.

/usr/local/apache2/bin/apachectl restart

Step 10: Test the Integration

Access the web application deployed to Oracle WebLogic Application Server using the Apache Web Server.

• Using Application Server's IP_Address:Port
• Through Apache Web Server IP_Address:Port

Now the incoming HTTP(s) requests within the Apache Web Server are reverse proxied across WebLogic Server Clusters 192.168.56.1:7001, 192.168.56.1:4003 & 192.168.56.1:4005automatically by the web server.

Complete Configuration Example

Here's a complete example of the Apache configuration:

# Apache httpd.conf
ServerRoot "/usr/local/apache2"
Listen 80

LoadModule mpm_prefork_module modules/mod_mpm_prefork.so
LoadModule dir_module modules/mod_dir.so
LoadModule mime_module modules/mod_mime.so
LoadModule weblogic_module modules/mod_wl.so

ServerName localhost
DocumentRoot "/usr/local/apache2/htdocs"

<Directory />
    AllowOverride none
    Require all denied
</Directory>

<Directory "/usr/local/apache2/htdocs">
    Options Indexes FollowSymLinks
    AllowOverride None
    Require all granted
</Directory>

# Include WebLogic plugin configuration
Include conf/mod_wl.conf

ErrorLog "logs/error_log"
LogLevel warn

<IfModule log_config_module>
    LogFormat "%h %l %u %t "%r" %>s %b "%{Referer}i" "%{User-Agent}i"" combined
    LogFormat "%h %l %u %t "%r" %>s %b" common
    CustomLog "logs/access_log" combined
</IfModule>

Advanced Configuration Options

Additional configuration options for the WebLogic plugin:

<Location /Monitoring_Application>
    SetHandler weblogic-handler
    WebLogicCluster 192.168.56.1:7001,192.168.56.1:4003,192.168.56.1:4005
    
    # Connection timeout (in seconds)
    ConnectTimeoutSecs 10
    
    # Read timeout (in seconds)
    ReadTimeoutSecs 60
    
    # Keep alive timeout (in seconds)
    KeepAliveSecs 60
    
    # Maximum number of connections
    MaxConnections 100
    
    # Debug level (OFF, ON, ERR, EMERG, ALERT, CRIT, ERR, WARN, NOTICE, INFO, DEBUG)
    Debug ON
    
    # Log file location
    WLLogFile /usr/local/apache2/logs/weblogic.log
    
    # SSL configuration (if using HTTPS)
    # WLProxySSL ON
    # WLProxySSLPassThrough ON
</Location>

Load Balancing Configuration

For better load balancing, you can configure multiple clusters:

# Primary cluster
<Location /Monitoring_Application>
    SetHandler weblogic-handler
    WebLogicCluster 192.168.56.1:7001,192.168.56.1:4003,192.168.56.1:4005
    Debug ON
    WLLogFile /usr/local/apache2/logs/weblogic.log
</Location>

# Backup cluster
<Location /Monitoring_Application/backup>
    SetHandler weblogic-handler
    WebLogicCluster 192.168.56.2:7001,192.168.56.2:4003,192.168.56.2:4005
    Debug ON
    WLLogFile /usr/local/apache2/logs/weblogic_backup.log
</Location>

SSL Configuration

To enable SSL termination at Apache:

LoadModule ssl_module modules/mod_ssl.so

<VirtualHost *:443>
    ServerName your-domain.com
    DocumentRoot "/usr/local/apache2/htdocs"
    
    SSLEngine on
    SSLCertificateFile /path/to/certificate.crt
    SSLCertificateKeyFile /path/to/private.key
    
    <Location /Monitoring_Application>
        SetHandler weblogic-handler
        WebLogicCluster 192.168.56.1:7001,192.168.56.1:4003,192.168.56.1:4005
        WLProxySSL ON
        WLProxySSLPassThrough ON
        Debug ON
        WLLogFile /usr/local/apache2/logs/weblogic_ssl.log
    </Location>
</VirtualHost>

Monitoring and Troubleshooting

Key files and commands for monitoring:

• Apache Error Log: /usr/local/apache2/logs/error_log
• WebLogic Plugin Log: /usr/local/apache2/logs/weblogic.log
• Apache Access Log: /usr/local/apache2/logs/access_log
• Test Configuration: apachectl configtest
• Check Module Loading: apachectl -M | grep weblogic

Benefits of Apache-WebLogic Integration

• Load Balancing: Distributes requests across multiple WebLogic instances
• SSL Termination: Handle SSL at Apache level for better performance
• Static Content Serving: Serve static files directly from Apache
• Security: Additional security layer and access control
• Monitoring: Centralized logging and monitoring
• High Availability: Failover capabilities across multiple servers

Modern Alternatives

While this approach is still valid, modern alternatives include:

• Docker Containers: Containerized deployments with Docker
• Kubernetes: Container orchestration with built-in load balancing
• Cloud Load Balancers: AWS ALB, Azure Application Gateway, GCP Load Balancer
• NGINX: Modern web server with better performance
• Traefik: Cloud-native reverse proxy and load balancer
• Istio: Service mesh for microservices

Best Practices

• Health Checks: Implement health check endpoints
• Connection Pooling: Configure appropriate connection pool sizes
• Timeout Configuration: Set appropriate timeout values
• Logging: Enable detailed logging for troubleshooting
• Security: Use HTTPS and implement proper security headers
• Monitoring: Set up monitoring and alerting