Enable search and background tasks in a cluster

In the seafile cluster, only one server should run the background tasks, including:

• indexing files for search
• email notification
• office documents converts service

You need to choose one node to run the background tasks.

Let's assume you have three nodes in your cluster: A, B, and C. And you decide that:

• Node A would run background tasks.
• Node B and C would be normal nodes.

Configuring Node A (the background-tasks node)

On this node, you need:

Install Java and LibreOffice

On Ubuntu/Debian:

sudo apt-get install openjdk-7-jre libreoffice python-uno # or python3-uno for ubuntu 14.04+

On CentOS/Red Hat:

sudo yum install java-1.7.0-openjdk
sudo yum install libreoffice libreoffice-headless libreoffice-pyuno

Note: Since version 3.1.12, java 1.7 is required, please check your java version by java -version. If not, please change the default java version.

Edit pro-data/seafevents.conf and ensure this line does NOT exist:

external_es_server = true

Edit seahub_settings.py and add a line:

OFFICE_CONVERTOR_NODE = True

Edit the firewall rules

In your firewall rules for node A, you should open the port 9500 (for search requests).

Configure Other Nodes

On nodes B and C, you need to:

• Edit pro-data/seafevents.conf, add the following lines:

  [INDEX FILES]
  external_es_server = true
  es_host = <ip of node A>
  es_port = 9500
  

Edit seahub_settings.py and add a line:

OFFICE_CONVERTOR_ROOT = http://<ip of node A>

Start the background tasks

Before starting background tasks, you have to start seafile on the background node too.

./seafile.sh start

On node A (the background tasks node), you can star/stop background tasks by:

./seafile-background-tasks.sh { start | stop | restart }