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2. Installation: Building TightBlog and running from IDE

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Glen Mazza edited this page Dec 25, 2025 · 1 revision

Build Requirements

First, let's make sure you have everything you need to install and run TightBlog. List below is for deploying a WAR on a standalone Tomcat server. The README on the main page lists two other deployment options (executable JAR with embedded Tomcat and Docker deployment), options which may remove the need for some of the items below.

  • JDK such as OpenJDK, version 25 or more recent. The computer on which you install TightBlog should already have the JDK installed and configured.

  • Tomcat 11 or another servlet container. The instructions here will cover Tomcat only. You'll need to consult your application server documentation to find out the server-specific configuration changes needed to run a WAR file on that server.

  • MySQL database.

  • An SMTP mail server or a Google gmail or similar account to send email notifications (new user, new comment, etc.). For the latter, best to create a new account just for the server instead of a personal one, as you have to store its password in the configuration and it is that email in the From: header when emails are sent out.

  • Gradle (any recent version), to build the TightBlog WAR file.

  • Docker desktop, needed only if desired to run the integration tests (which use Testcontainers for MySQL).

  • (Optional) Additional blog themes besides the two that TightBlog ships with. While the TightBlog UI allows theme customization, you may find it faster to preload an already defined theme for bloggers to use.

Building TightBlog

  1. From the releases page, download and uncompress either the ZIP or .tar.gz versions.

  2. If you have any weblog themes you wish to add (or remove) from your TightBlog installation, do so now from the tightblog/src/main/webapp/blogthemes folder.

  3. Start Docker Desktop if desired to run the integration tests during the build (next step).

  4. From the tightblog folder, run gradle clean build to generate your TightBlog war. Once done, the tightblog-*.war that you will deploy on your servlet container will be located in the build/libs folder. If you plan on making this the default application for Tomcat, rename the file to ROOT.war before deploying it.

Running TightBlog from IntelliJ IDEA (for development and debugging)

  1. Place your application-tbcustom.properties in the base folder of the TightBlog project.

  2. In IntelliJ, choose Run | Edit Configurations from the menu. See screenshot below for the settings used. Note the --add-opens java.base/java.lang=ALL-UNNAMED goes in the VM options section (which you may need to manually add, see the Modify Options dropdown) RunEditConfigurations

  3. Then from IntelliJ choose Run | Run... or Debug... and pick the configuration created above.

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