GridGain Developers Hub

Setting Up

System Requirements

GridGain was officially tested on:

JDK

Oracle JDK 8, 11 or 17, Open JDK 8, 11 or 17, IBM JDK 8, 11 or 17

OS

Linux (any flavor), Mac OSX (10.6 and up), Windows (XP and up), Windows Server (2008 and up), Oracle Solaris, z/OS

ISA

x86, x64, SPARC, PowerPC

Network

No restrictions (10G recommended)

Running GridGain with Java 11 or later

To run GridGain with Java 11 or later:

  • Set the JAVA_HOME environment variable to point to the Java installation directory.

  • Pass specific flags to JVM to make proprietary SDK APIs available. These APIs If you use the start-up script ignite.sh (or ignite.bat for Windows), you do not need to do anything because these flags are already set up in the script. Otherwise, provide the following parameters to the JVM of your application:

    --add-exports=java.base/jdk.internal.misc=ALL-UNNAMED
    --add-exports=java.base/sun.nio.ch=ALL-UNNAMED
    --add-exports=java.management/com.sun.jmx.mbeanserver=ALL-UNNAMED
    --add-exports=jdk.internal.jvmstat/sun.jvmstat.monitor=ALL-UNNAMED
    --add-exports=java.base/sun.reflect.generics.reflectiveObjects=ALL-UNNAMED
    --add-opens=jdk.management/com.sun.management.internal=ALL-UNNAMED
    --illegal-access=permit
    --add-opens=java.base/jdk.internal.misc=ALL-UNNAMED
    --add-opens=java.base/sun.nio.ch=ALL-UNNAMED
    --add-opens=java.management/com.sun.jmx.mbeanserver=ALL-UNNAMED
    --add-opens=jdk.internal.jvmstat/sun.jvmstat.monitor=ALL-UNNAMED
    --add-opens=java.base/sun.reflect.generics.reflectiveObjects=ALL-UNNAMED
    --add-opens=jdk.management/com.sun.management.internal=ALL-UNNAMED
    --add-opens=java.base/java.io=ALL-UNNAMED
    --add-opens=java.base/java.nio=ALL-UNNAMED
    --add-opens=java.base/java.util=ALL-UNNAMED
    --add-opens=java.base/java.util.concurrent=ALL-UNNAMED
    --add-opens=java.base/java.util.concurrent.locks=ALL-UNNAMED
    --add-opens=java.base/java.util.concurrent.atomic=ALL-UNNAMED
    --add-opens=java.base/java.lang=ALL-UNNAMED
    --add-opens=java.base/java.lang.invoke=ALL-UNNAMED
    --add-opens=java.base/java.math=ALL-UNNAMED
    --add-opens=java.sql/java.sql=ALL-UNNAMED
    --add-opens=java.base/java.net=ALL-UNNAMED
    --add-opens=java.base/java.security.cert=ALL-UNNAMED
    --add-opens=java.base/sun.security.x509=ALL-UNNAMED
    --add-opens=java.base/sun.security.ssl=ALL-UNNAMED

Using Binary Distribution

  • Download the appropriate binary package from GridGain downloads.

  • Unzip the archive into a directory.

  • (Optional) Set the IGNITE_HOME environment variable to point to the installation folder and make sure there is no trailing / in the path.

Using Maven

The easiest way to start developing with GridGain is to use Maven.

  • Add GridGain’s External Repository to the maven configuration file (see the configuration example below).

  • Set the gridgain.version property to the actual version you want to use.

  • Add the gridgain-core or gridgain-ultimate dependency if you want to use GridGain Enterprise or Ultimate Edition.

<properties>
    <gridgain.version>8.9.3</gridgain.version>
</properties>

<repositories>
    <repository>
        <id>GridGain Repository</id>
        <url>https://www.gridgainsystems.com/nexus/content/repositories/external</url>
    </repository>
</repositories>

<dependencies>

    <dependency>
        <groupId>org.gridgain</groupId>
        <artifactId>ignite-core</artifactId>
        <version>${gridgain.version}</version>
    </dependency>

    <dependency>
        <groupId>org.gridgain</groupId>
        <artifactId>ignite-spring</artifactId>
        <version>${gridgain.version}</version>
    </dependency>

    <dependency>
        <groupId>org.gridgain</groupId>
        <artifactId>ignite-indexing</artifactId>
        <version>${gridgain.version}</version>
    </dependency>

</dependencies>
<properties>
    <gridgain.version>8.9.3</gridgain.version>
</properties>

<repositories>
    <repository>
        <id>GridGain Repository</id>
        <url>https://www.gridgainsystems.com/nexus/content/repositories/external</url>
    </repository>
</repositories>

<dependencies>

    <dependency>
        <groupId>org.gridgain</groupId>
        <artifactId>ignite-core</artifactId>
        <version>${gridgain.version}</version>
    </dependency>

    <dependency>
        <groupId>org.gridgain</groupId>
        <artifactId>ignite-spring</artifactId>
        <version>${gridgain.version}</version>
    </dependency>

    <dependency>
        <groupId>org.gridgain</groupId>
        <artifactId>ignite-indexing</artifactId>
        <version>${gridgain.version}</version>
    </dependency>

    <!-- GridGain Enterprise Edition features -->
    <dependency>
        <groupId>org.gridgain</groupId>
        <artifactId>gridgain-core</artifactId>
        <version>${gridgain.version}</version>
    </dependency>

</dependencies>
<properties>
    <gridgain.version>8.9.3</gridgain.version>
</properties>

<repositories>
    <repository>
        <id>GridGain Repository</id>
        <url>https://www.gridgainsystems.com/nexus/content/repositories/external</url>
    </repository>
</repositories>

<dependencies>

    <dependency>
        <groupId>org.gridgain</groupId>
        <artifactId>ignite-core</artifactId>
        <version>${gridgain.version}</version>
    </dependency>

    <dependency>
        <groupId>org.gridgain</groupId>
        <artifactId>ignite-spring</artifactId>
        <version>${gridgain.version}</version>
    </dependency>

    <dependency>
        <groupId>org.gridgain</groupId>
        <artifactId>ignite-indexing</artifactId>
        <version>${gridgain.version}</version>
    </dependency>

    <!-- GridGain Ultimate Edition features. -->
    <dependency>
        <groupId>org.gridgain</groupId>
        <artifactId>gridgain-ultimate</artifactId>
        <version>${gridgain.version}</version>
    </dependency>

</dependencies>

Using Docker

If you want to run GridGain in Docker, refer to the Docker Deployment section.

Configuring Work Directory

GridGain uses a work directory to store your application data (if you use the Native Persistence feature), index files, metadata information, logs, and other files. The default work directory is as follows:

  • $IGNITE_HOME/work, if the IGNITE_HOME system property is defined. This is the case when you start GridGain using the bin/ignite.sh script from the distribution package.

  • ./ignite/work, this path is relative to the directory where you launch your application.

There are several ways you can change the default work directory:

  1. As an environmental variable:

    export IGNITE_WORK_DIR=/path/to/work/directory
  2. In the node configuration:

    <bean class="org.apache.ignite.configuration.IgniteConfiguration">
        <property name="workDirectory" value="/path/to/work/directory"/>
        <!-- other properties -->
    </bean>
    IgniteConfiguration igniteCfg = new IgniteConfiguration();
    
    //setting the work directory
    igniteCfg.setWorkDirectory("/path/to/work/directory");
    var cfg = new IgniteConfiguration
    {
        WorkDirectory = "/path/to/work/directory"
    };
    IgniteConfiguration cfg;
    
    cfg.igniteHome = "/path/to/work/directory";

Enabling Modules

GridGain ships with a number of modules that provide various functionality. You can enable modules one by one, as required.

All modules are included in the binary distribution, but by default they are disabled (except for ignite-core, ignite-spring, ignite-indexing, and ignite-opencensus). Modules can be found in the lib/optional directory of the distribution package (each module is located in a separate sub-directory).

Depending on how you use GridGain, you can enable modules using one of the following methods:

  • If you use the binary distribution, move the lib/optional/{module-dir} to the lib directory before starting the node.

  • Add libraries from lib/optional/{module-dir} to the classpath of your application.

  • Add a module as a Maven dependency to your project.

    <dependency>
        <groupId>org.gridgain</groupId>
        <artifactId>ignite-indexing</artifactId>
        <version>${gridgain.version}</version>
    </dependency>

The following modules are available:

Module’s artifactId Description

gridgain-bulkload

Support for SQL COPY FROM INTO statement that can be used to import or export data in csv, parquet, and iceberg formats. See COPY INTO for details.

gridgain-sql

Support for JSON functions. See JSON Functions for details.

ignite-aop

GridGain AOP module provides capability to turn any Java method to a distributed closure by adding @Gridify annotation to it.

ignite-aws

Cluster discovery on AWS S3. Refer to Amazon S3 IP Finder for details.

ignite-cassandra-serializers

The GridGain Cassandra Serializers module provides additional serializers to store objects as BLOBs in Cassandra. The module could be used as in conjunction with the GridGain Cassandra Store module.

ignite-cassandra-store

GridGain Cassandra Store provides a CacheStore implementation backed by the Cassandra database.

ignite-cloud

GridGain Cloud provides Apache jclouds implementations of the IP finder for TCP discovery.

ignite-direct-io

GridGain Direct IO is a plugin that provides a page store with the ability to write and read cache partitions in O_DIRECT mode.

ignite-gce

GridGain GCE provides Google Cloud Storage based implementations of IP finder for TCP discovery.

ignite-hibernate-core

ignite-hibernate_4.2

GridGain Hibernate provides Hibernate L2 cache implementation based on GridGain In-Memory Data Grid.

ignite-hibernate_5.1

GridGain Hibernate provides Hibernate L2 cache implementation based on GridGain In-Memory Data Grid.

ignite-indexing

SQL querying and indexing

ignite-jcl

Support for the Jakarta Common Logging (JCL) framework.

ignite-jta

Integration of GridGain transactions with JTA.

ignite-kafka

GridGain Kafka Streamer provides capability to stream data from Kafka to GridGain caches.

ignite-kubernetes

GridGain Kubernetes module provides a TCP Discovery IP Finder that uses a dedicated Kubernetes service for IP addresses lookup of GridGain pods containerized by Kubernetes.

ignite-log4j2

Support for Log4j2

ignite-ml

GridGain ML Grid provides machine learning features and relevant data structures and methods of linear algebra, including on heap and off heap, dense and sparse, local and distributed implementations. Refer to the Machine Learning documentation for details.

ignite-osgi

This module provides bridging components to make GridGain run seamlessly inside an OSGi container such as Apache Karaf.

ignite-osgi-karaf

This module contains a feature repository to facilitate installing GridGain into an Apache Karaf container.

ignite-osgi-paxlogging

This module is an OSGi fragment that exposes the following packages from the Pax Logging API bundle:

  • org.apache.log4j.varia

  • org.apache.log4j.xml

These packages are required when installing the ignite-log4j bundle, and are not exposed by default by the Pax Logging API - the logging framework used by Apache Karaf.

ignite-rest-http

GridGain REST-HTTP starts a Jetty-based server within a node that can be used to execute tasks and/or cache commands in grid using HTTP-based RESTful APIs.

ignite-schedule

This module provides functionality for scheduling jobs locally using UNIX cron-based syntax.

ignite-slf4j

Support for SLF4J logging framework.

ignite-spring-data

GridGain Spring Data provides an integration with Spring Data framework.

ignite-spring-data_2.0

GridGain Spring Data 2.0 provides an integration with Spring Data 2.0 framework.

ignite-ssh

The GridGain SSH module provides capabilities to start GridGain nodes on remote machines via SSH.

ignite-tensorflow

The GridGain TensorFlow Integration Module allows using TensorFlow with GridGain. In this scenario GridGain will be a data source for any TensorFlow model training.

ignite-urideploy

GridGain URI Deploy module provides capabilities to deploy tasks from different sources such as File System, HTTP, or even Email.

ignite-web

GridGain Web allows you to start nodes inside any web container based on servlet and servlet context listener. In addition, this module provides capabilities to cache web sessions in a GridGain cache.

ignite-zookeeper

GridGain ZooKeeper provides a TCP Discovery IP Finder that uses a ZooKeeper directory to discover other GridGain nodes.

Configuration Recommendations

Below are some recommended configuration tips aimed at making it easier for you to operate a GridGain cluster or develop applications with GridGain.

Setting Work Directory

If you are going to use either binary distribution or Maven, you are encouraged to set up the work directory for GridGain. The work directory is used to store metadata information, index files, your application data (if you use the Native Persistence feature), logs, and other files. We recommend you always set up the work directory.

Logs play an important role when it comes to troubleshooting and finding what went wrong. Here are a few general tips on how to manage your log files:

  • Do not store log files in the /tmp folder. This folder is cleared up every time the server is restarted.

  • Make sure that there is enough space available on the storage where the log files are stored.

  • Archive old log files periodically to save on storage space.