In this how to i will describe how to install RED5 server on Centos 5.3. This how to can be used to install RED5 server on Centos 4 and Fedora 8 – 11 as well. RED5 is open source flash server written in java supports streaming audio/video, recording client streams, shared objects, live stream publishing etc.

1) Download and Install Java

RED5 server depends on Java. CentOS 5.3 comes with OpenJDK 1.6 and install it using yum.

yum -y install java-1.6.0-openjdk java-1.6.0-openjdk-devel

2) Download and Install Ant (Apache Project)

Ant will need to compile RED5 server code. Ant comes in binary form, so just download and install it in /usr/local directory.

cd /usr/src
wget http://mirrors.kahuki.com/apache/ant/binaries/apache-ant-1.8.0-bin.tar.bz2
tar jxvf apache-ant-1.8.0-bin.tar.bz2
mv apache-ant-1.8.0 /usr/local/ant

3) Export Variables for Ant and Java

export ANT_HOME=/usr/local/ant
export JAVA_HOME=/usr/lib/jvm/java
export PATH=$PATH:/usr/local/ant/bin
export CLASSPATH=.:$JAVA_HOME/lib/classes.zip

Also export these variables in /etc/bashrc to become available for every user login or for any terminal opens.

echo ‘export ANT_HOME=/usr/local/ant’ >> /etc/bashrc
echo ‘export JAVA_HOME=/usr/lib/jvm/java’ >> /etc/bashrc
echo ‘export PATH=$PATH:/usr/local/ant/bin’ >> /etc/bashrc
echo ‘export CLASSPATH=.:$JAVA_HOME/lib/classes.zip’ >> /etc/bashrc

4) Download and Install RED5 Server

Here the latest version available for RED5 is 0.7 on site but download from google code using svn as the tarball of 0.7 on site is missing some of the files.

cd /usr/src
svn checkout http://red5.googlecode.com/svn/java/server/trunk/ red5
mv red5 /usr/local/
cd /usr/local/red5
ant prepare
ant dist

you will see a ton of lines, but you should get at last

BUILD SUCCESSFUL

that’s mean its install and now copy the conf directory from dist/ and test the red5 installation.

cp -r dist/conf .
./red5.sh

If it shows Installer service created in the last then everything is fine here, press ctrl+c and move to next step to create init script.

5) Init Script

Now we will create init script for red5 to start, stop and restart easily.

vi /etc/init.d/red5

download http://www.sohailriaz.com/downloads/red5.txt and copy / paste code in it. The init script code also be viewed below.

#!/bin/sh
# For RedHat and cousins:
# chkconfig: 2345 85 85
# description: Red5 flash streaming server
# processname: red5

PROG=red5
RED5_HOME=/usr/local/red5
DAEMON=$RED5_HOME/$PROG.sh
PIDFILE=/var/run/$PROG.pid

# Source function library
. /etc/rc.d/init.d/functions

[ -r /etc/sysconfig/red5 ] && . /etc/sysconfig/red5

RETVAL=0

case “$1″ in
start)
echo -n $”Starting $PROG: ”
cd $RED5_HOME
$DAEMON >/dev/null 2>/dev/null &
RETVAL=$?
if [ $RETVAL -eq 0 ]; then
echo $! > $PIDFILE
touch /var/lock/subsys/$PROG

fi
[ $RETVAL -eq 0 ] && success $”$PROG startup” || failure $”$PROG startup”
echo
;;
stop)
echo -n $”Shutting down $PROG: ”
killproc -p $PIDFILE
RETVAL=$?
echo
[ $RETVAL -eq 0 ] && rm -f /var/lock/subsys/$PROG
;;
restart)
$0 stop
$0 start
;;
status)
status $PROG -p $PIDFILE
RETVAL=$?
;;
*)
echo $”Usage: $0 {start|stop|restart|status}”
RETVAL=1
esac

exit $RETVAL

Now start the service

/etc/init.d/red5 start

check status

/etc/init.d/red5 status
red5 (pid  XXXXX) is running…

again you can do stop, restart.

6) Test

Now test the RED5 installation by opening following URL in browser

http://yourip:5080/

you will see red5 page like this

and demos can be find here.

http://yourip:5080/demos/

You can use simple port tester tool that determines which ports the Flash Player is able to connect through to the Red5 server. Put your server address or IP in HOST when using port tester. You should get SUCCESS on RTMP or port 1935. If not please check your firewall.

http://yourip:5080/demos/port_tester.html

7) ISSUE

When you run ./red5.sh, it will show you Installer service created. Thats mean everything runs fine and red5 server is up. But if you went to port_tester.swf using demos above or your application shows connections FAILS, this is an issue of RTMPT and RTMPTS. You can see it by running

/usr/local/red5/red5.sh

output trancated

[INFO] [main] org.red5.server.tomcat.TomcatLoader – RTMPT server bean was not found
[INFO] [main] org.red5.server.tomcat.TomcatLoader – RTMPS server bean was not found

output truncated

If you see this you have to uncomment the RTMPT and RTMPTS TomcatLoader in/usr/local/red5/conf/red5-core.xml

vi /usr/local/red5/conf/red5-core.xml

Search for a lines

<!– RTMPT –>
<!–
<bean id=”rtmpt.server” class=”org.red5.server.net.rtmpt.TomcatRTMPTLoader” init-method=”init” lazy-init=”true”>

Remove the <!– from start of <bean and –> from end of </bean>

Same goes for RTMPS

<!– RTMPS –>
<!–
<bean id=”rtmps.server” class=”org.red5.server.net.rtmps.TomcatRTMPSLoader” init-method=”init” lazy-init=”true”>

Remove the <!– from start of <bean and –> from end of </bean>

Restart the red5 services and connection fails problem will be fixed.

If you any question please use comments.