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Version: 2023.1

Server configuration - processes

Your application must have a -processes.xml file. This contains the configuration of each module in the application (Data Server, Request Server, Event Handler, etc). It is created automatically when you start a new Genesis project using GenX CLI tool, but you might well want to update it - and you certainly want to take a good look at it.

Every process (module) in your application needs to have an entry in this -processes.xml file. If you add a new process, then you must add its details to this file. Otherwise, it will simply not be part of the built application.

The generated file​

When you run the command genesisInstall, the details of the processes.xml file are aggregated with details from internal Genesis files (for example, auth-processes.xml) into a single newly-generated processes.xml file in the generated folder.

Very important commands like startServer, killServer, startProcess and killProcess all refer to the generated file to check which processes they need to act on.

Below is an example of a generated processes.xml file for an application that has:

  • a Data Server
  • a Request Server
  • an Event Handler
  • a Consolidator
  • a Streamer and Streamer Client

You can see that this file has separate code blocks for each of the application's processes. Each code block has tags that define the characteristics of the process.

<processes>
  <process name="POSITION_APP_DATASERVER">
    <groupId>POSITION_APP</groupId>
    <start>true</start>
    <options>-Xmx256m</options>
    <module>genesis-pal-dataserver</module>
    <package>global.genesis.dataserver.pal</package>
    <script>position_app-dataserver.kts</script>
    <description>Displays real-time details</description>
    <language>pal</language>
    <classpath>quickfixj-core-*.jar</classpath>
  </process>
  <process name="POSITION_APP_REQUEST_SERVER">
    <groupId>POSITION_APP</groupId>
    <start>true</start>
    <options>-Xmx256m</options>
    <module>genesis-pal-requestserver</module>
    <package>global.genesis.requestreply.pal</package>
    <script>position_app-reqrep.kts</script>
    <description>Server one-shot requests for details</description>
    <language>pal</language>
  </process>
  <process name="POSITION_APP_EVENT_HANDLER">
    <groupId>POSITION_APP</groupId>
    <start>true</start>
    <options>-Xmx256m -DRedirectStreamsToLog=true</options>
    <module>genesis-pal-eventhandler</module>
    <package>global.genesis.eventhandler.pal</package>
    <script>position_app-eventhandler.kts</script>
    <description>Handles events</description>
    <classpath>position_app-messages*,position_app-eventhandler*</classpath>
    <language>pal</language>
  </process>
  <process name="POSITION_APP_CONSOLIDATOR">
      <groupId>POSITION_APP</groupId>
      <start>true</start>
      <options>-Xmx256m -DRedirectStreamsToLog=true  -DXSD_VALIDATE=false</options>
      <module>consolidator2</module>
      <package>global.genesis.consolidator2</package>
      <config>position_app-consolidator2.xml</config>
      <loggingLevel>INFO,DATADUMP_OFF</loggingLevel>
      <dependency>POSITION_APP_EVENT_HANDLER</dependency>
  </process>
  <process name="POSITION_APP_STREAMER_CLIENT">
      <start>true</start>
      <options>-Xmx128m -DXSD_VALIDATE=false</options>
      <module>genesis-pal-streamerclient</module>
      <package>global.genesis.streamerclient.pal</package>
      <script>position_app-streamer-client.kts</script>
  </process>
  <process name="POSITION_APP_STREAMER">
      <start>true</start>
      <options>-Xmx128m -DXSD_VALIDATE=false</options>
      <module>genesis-pal-streamer</module>
      <package>global.genesis.streamer.pal</package>
      <script>position_app-streamer.kts</script>
      <configOverridesFile>/home/genesis/appstreamer.properties</configOverridesFile>
  </process>
</processes>

Tags​

For each process, the tags define key information. Let's look at the tags that are available.

dependency​

This tag defines a comma-separated list of processes that the current process is dependent on. In the above example, the POSITION_APP_CONSOLIDATOR process will only start once the POSITION_APP_EVENT_HANDLER process is running.

When you are defining the process in your application's process.xml, this tag is optional.

loggingLevel​

This tag defines the default log level for the process, which is based on slf4j levels. It also accepts DATADUMP_ON/DATADUMP_OFF to explicitly declare that you would like to log all the received/sent network messages.

When you are defining the process in your application's process.xml, this tag is optional.

classpath​

This tag defines additional jar files that might be needed by the microservices. The jar files declared in this section have to be comma-separated and need to exist within a lib or bin folder for any of the genesis products in the environment.

You can use wild cards in your specification. This can be seen in the classpath for the POSITION_APP_DATASERVER and POSITION_APP_EVENT_HANDLER configuration in the example above.

When you are defining the process in your application's process.xml, this tag is optional.

start​

This tag defines whether the process needs to be started when startServer command is executed and whether to show this process in the mon command display. Default value is true

options​

This tag defines JVM arguments.

When you are defining the process in your application's process.xml, this tag is optional.

package​

This tag defines which package the process should refer to. All Genesis source code is contained in packages. So, in the example above, the configuration for the POSITION_APP_STREAMER process points to the source code in the package global.genesis.streamer.pal. Multiple package scans needs to be comma-separated.

module​

This tag defines where in the package (see above) the process should look for its binaries - base jar files. In the above example, the configuration of the POSITION_APP_EVENT_HANDLER has a module tag that points to genesis-pal-eventhandler. This finds every jar file with the text genesis-pal-eventhandler and gets all the relevant classpath dependencies.

When you are defining the process in your application's process.xml, this tag is mandatory.

config​

This tag defines which config file the process should refer to.

When you are defining the process in your application's process.xml, this tag is mandatory for some services.

script​

This tag defines which script file the process should refer to.

When you are defining the process in its process.xml, if the process uses scripts, then you have to specify the script file using this tag. In the example above, the POSITION_APP_REQUEST_SERVER has a script tag identifying position_app-reqrep.kts, which is where the configuration of the Request Server exists. If you are not using scripts for the process, then this tag is not needed.

language​

This tag defines what language the script is using. The default value is Groovy. Accepted values are [pal, groovy, R].

When you are defining the process in your application's process.xml, this tag is mandatory if you have specified a script file.

scheduleRestart​

This tag requires a boolean value. It controls what the platform does if the process dies unexpectedly. If set to true; the process will be restarted automatically. The default value is false.

When you are defining the process in your application's process.xml, this tag is optional.

groupId​

Use this tag if you want to make the process part of a pre-defined group. You must specify the groupID of the group you have created. For example, the genesis process belongs to the GENESIS group. For any new application, the value for groupId will be application name. The commands startGroup and killGroup use the groupId to start or kill groups of processes.

When you are defining the process in your application's process.xml, this tag is optional.

description​

This tag provides a simple description of the process.

When you are defining the process in your application's process.xml, this tag is optional.

primaryOnly​

This tag specifies that the process can only run on the primary node in a cluster. It requires a boolean value: true or false. The default value is false.

When you are defining the process in your application's process.xml, this tag is optional.

arguments​

This tag helps in hard-coding the process arguments for starting the processes, since some processes always need arguments on startup.

When you are defining the process in your application's process.xml, this tag is optional.

configOverridesFile​

This tag specifies another config file (properties format) that this process will read on startup. The properties in this file will override the system-definitions file.