solr Getting started with solr

Remarks

Introduction

Solr is a standalone enterprise search server with a REST-like API. You put documents in it (called "indexing") via JSON, XML, CSV or binary over HTTP. You query it via HTTP GET and receive JSON, XML, CSV or binary results. Solr uses the Lucene search library and extends it.

Here are some of the main features that solr provides:

- Advanced Full-Text Search Capabilities

Powered by Lucene™, Solr enables powerful matching capabilities including phrases, wildcards, joins, grouping and much more across any data type

• Optimized for High Volume Traffic

Solr is proven at extremely large scales the world over

• Standards Based Open Interfaces - XML, JSON and HTTP

Solr uses the tools you use to make application building a snap

• Comprehensive Administration Interfaces

Solr ships with a built-in, responsive administrative user interface to make it easy to control your Solr instances

• Easy Monitoring

Need more insight into your instances? Solr publishes loads of metric data via JMX

• Highly Scalable and Fault Tolerant

Built on the battle-tested Apache Zookeeper, Solr makes it easy to scale up and down. Solr bakes in replication, distribution, rebalancing and fault tolerance out of the box.

• Flexible and Adaptable with easy configuration

Solr's is designed to adapt to your needs all while simplifying configuration

• Near Real-Time Indexing

Want to see your updates now? Solr takes advantage of Lucene's Near Real-Time Indexing capabilities to make sure you see your content when you want to see it

• Extensible Plugin Architecture

Solr publishes many well-defined extension points that make it easy to plugin both index and query time plugins. Of course, since it is Apache-licensed open source, you can change any code you want!

Some solr cool features:

• Schema when you want, schemaless when you don't

Use Solr's data-driven schemaless mode when getting started and then lock it down when it's time for production.

• Powerful Extensions

Solr ships with optional plugins for indexing rich content (e.g. PDFs, Word), language detection, search results clustering and more

• Faceted Search and Filtering

Slice and dice your data as you see fit using a large array of faceting algorithms

• Geospatial Search

Enabling location-based search is simple with Solr's built-in support for spatial search

• Query Suggestions, Spelling and More

Solr ships with advanced capabilites for auto-complete (typeahead search), spell checking and more

• Rich Document Parsing

Solr ships with Apache Tika built-in, making it easy to index rich content such as Adobe PDF, Microsoft Word and more.

Example of Solr Search

Installing SOLR

Introduction

The following procedure was tested on a test instance in AWS, with Redhat and Solr 6.1.0 . You may need to adjust the process to your operating system and environment accordingly.

Prerequisites

1. Make sure you use RedHat or a similar (Fedora-based) OS.
   cat /etc/redhat-release
   displays your OS version.

2. Check if java 1.6 or higher is installed
   which java

3. Install Java if necessary
   sudo yum list available java*

sudo yum install java-1.8.0-openjdk.x86_64

4. Check if it is installed correctly
   which java displays the Java home
   java -version displays the Java version

5. Create a SOLR user.
   sudo adduser solr

6. Add a password for the user.
   sudo passwd solr

7. Enable sudo on the SOLR user, run visudo
   sudo visudo

8. Find the following lines:
   ## Allows people in group wheel to run all commands
# %wheel ALL=(ALL) ALL

9. If %wheel is commented out, uncomment the second line by removing the # character.
   %wheel ALL=(ALL) ALL

10. If you made a change use :wq otherwise use :q to quit.

11. Add the solr user to the wheel group.
    sudo usermod -aG wheel solr

12. Switch over to the solr user an check if you have root privileges:
    su solr -
sudo whoami

Downloading SOLR

13. Find your local mirror at: http://www.apache.org/dyn/closer.lua/lucene/solr/

14. Change your directory location to opt:
    cd /opt/

15. Download a copy of the package from the mirror:
    sudo curl -O http://www.trieuvan.com/apache/lucene/solr/6.1.0/solr-6.1.0.tgz

16. Untar the package:
    sudo tar zxvf solr-6.1.0.tgz

17. Copy the installer script to your folder:
    sudo cp /opt/solr-6.1.0/bin/install_solr_service.sh .

18. Remove the unnecessary files:
    sudo rm -rf solr-6.1.0

Install

1. Run the install script:
   sudo ./install_solr_service.sh solr-6.1.0.tgz
2. Make SOLR service autostart when the server is rebooted.
   sudo chkconfig --add solr
chkconfig | grep solr
3. Change service owner
   sudo chown -R solr:solr /var/solr/

Testing your installation

1. Create a core from command line:
   sudo su - solr -c "/opt/solr/bin/solr create -c NewCore1 -n data_driven_schema_configs"
2. Open the Admin in a browser:
   http://<solr_server>:8983/solr/#/
3. Open the list of cores in the menu to see the NewCore1 core.
4. Test if cores are sticky:
   sudo service solr restart
5. Refresh the Admin in a browser:
   http://<solr_server>:8983/solr/#/ Make sure the Admin page reloads and the core reappears after the reboot.
6. View server status in the command line:
   sudo service solr status
7. Prepare a new core config for core creation in the Web Admin, by changing your directory location to data:
   cd var/solr/data/
8. This is where the new cores are stored:
   ll
9. The newly created core's conf folder can be used as a template:
   ll NewCore1/
10. Create a folder for another core you will create in the Web Admin:
    mkdir CoreFromWebAdmin
11. Copy the conf directory over to the new location:
    sudo cp -R NewCore1/conf/ CoreFromWebAdmin
12. Switch to the Web Admin interface in your browser
13. Click Add Core
14. Add CoreFromWebAdmin as the name and the folder for the new core.
15. Open the new core.
16. Click documents to add docs.
17. Select XML format and paste the code below:

<add><doc>
  <field name="id">F9V7464-APL-KIT</field>
  <field name="name">Belkin Mobile Power Cord for iPod w/ Dock</field>
  <field name="manu">Belkin</field>
  <!-- Join -->
  <field name="manu_id_s">belkin</field>
  <field name="cat">electronics</field>
  <field name="cat">connector</field>
  <field name="features">car power adapter, white</field>
  <field name="weight">4.0</field>
  <field name="price">19.95</field>
  <field name="popularity">1</field>
  <field name="inStock">false</field>
  <!-- Buffalo store -->
  <field name="store">45.18014,-93.87741</field>
  <field name="manufacturedate_dt">2005-08-01T16:30:25Z</field>
</doc>

<doc>
  <field name="id">IW-032</field>
  <field name="name">iPod &amp; iPod Mini USB 2.0 Cable</field>
  <field name="manu">Belkin</field>
  <!-- Join -->
  <field name="manu_id_s">belkin</field>
  <field name="cat">electronics</field>
  <field name="cat">connector</field>
  <field name="features">car power adapter for iPod, white</field>
  <field name="weight">2.0</field>
  <field name="price">11.50</field>
  <field name="popularity">1</field>
  <field name="inStock">false</field>
  <!-- San Francisco store -->
  <field name="store">37.7752,-122.4232</field>
  <field name="manufacturedate_dt">2006-02-14T23:55:59Z</field>
</doc>
<doc>
  <field name="id">F887464-APL-KIT</field>
  <field name="name">Belkin Mobile Power Cord for iPod w/ Dock</field>
  <field name="manu">Belkin</field>
  <!-- Join -->
  <field name="manu_id_s">belkin</field>
  <field name="cat">electronics</field>
  <field name="cat">connector</field>
  <field name="features">car power adapter, black</field>
  <field name="weight">4.0</field>
  <field name="price">19.95</field>
  <field name="popularity">1</field>
  <field name="inStock">true</field>
  <!-- Buffalo store -->
  <field name="store">45.18014,-93.87741</field>
  
</doc>
<doc>
  <field name="id">FAV7464-APL-KIT</field>
  <field name="name">Belkin Mobile Power Cord for iPod w/ Dock</field>
  <field name="manu">Belkin</field>
  <!-- Join -->
  <field name="manu_id_s">belkin</field>
  <field name="cat">electronics</field>
  <field name="cat">connector</field>
  <field name="features">car power adapter, blue</field>
  <field name="weight">4.0</field>
  <field name="price">15.95</field>
  <field name="popularity">2</field>
  <field name="inStock">true</field>
  <!-- Buffalo store -->
  <field name="store">45.18014,-93.87741</field>
  <field name="manufacturedate_dt">2015-09-21T16:30:25Z</field>
</doc></add>
 

If your response returns a success, you have successfully installed SOLR and verified your installation.