cohesive-cmdbuild-dev

Self-contained development environment for CMDBuild backend. Clone this repo and be ready to develop in minutes.

Prerequisites

• Docker (with docker compose)
• JDK 17+
• Maven 3.8+
• Python 3 (for module detection)
• Git
• Access to a PostgreSQL database with CMDBuild schema

Quick Start

# 1. Clone this repo
git clone https://github.com/genpat-it/cohesive-cmdbuild-dev.git
cd cohesive-cmdbuild-dev

# 2. Configure database connection
cp conf/database.conf.example conf/database.conf
vi conf/database.conf

# 3. Bootstrap everything (clone source, build WAR, start container)
./setup.sh

CMDBuild will be available at http://localhost:8080/cmdbuild.

Using a Private Repository

If your source repo requires authentication, set these before running setup.sh:

export GIT_REPO=https://your-git-server/org/cmdbuild.git
export GIT_BRANCH=develop
export GIT_TOKEN=your-access-token
./setup.sh

Or create a .env file (git-ignored):

GIT_REPO=https://your-git-server/org/cmdbuild.git
GIT_BRANCH=develop
GIT_TOKEN=your-access-token
DB_URL=jdbc:postgresql://dbhost:5432/cmdbuild
DB_USER=postgres
DB_PASS=postgres

How It Works

setup.sh automatically clones two repositories:

1. CMDBuild source (./source/) - the Java codebase you'll be working on
2. cohesive-cmdbuild-builder (./war-builder/) - a Docker-based tool that compiles the full CMDBuild WAR file

The war-builder is used during initial setup and whenever you need a full rebuild (dev-deploy.sh --full). For daily development, dev-deploy.sh only rebuilds the changed Maven modules and copies the JARs directly — no full WAR rebuild needed.

Daily Workflow

# Edit Java files in ./source/

# Auto-detect changes and deploy JARs (no restart needed for many changes)
./dev-deploy.sh

# Deploy and restart Tomcat
./dev-deploy.sh -r

# Deploy a specific module
./dev-deploy.sh dao/postgresql

# Check what's changed
./dev-deploy.sh -s

# Full WAR rebuild (when dependencies change, pom.xml edits, etc.)
./dev-deploy.sh -f

Architecture

┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│  Your machine                                       │
│                                                     │
│  ./source/          Maven source code (git clone)   │
│       │                                             │
│       │ mvn package -pl <module>                    │
│       ▼                                             │
│  module/target/*.jar                                │
│       │                                             │
│       │ cp → ./webapp/WEB-INF/lib/                  │
│       ▼                                             │
│  ./webapp/          Exploded WAR (mounted volume)   │
│       │                                             │
│ ┌─────┴──────────────────────────────────────────┐  │
│ │  Docker: tomcat:9.0-jdk17                      │  │
│ │  ./webapp → /usr/local/tomcat/webapps/cmdbuild │  │
│ │  network_mode: host (port 8080)                │  │
│ └────────────────────────────────────────────────┘  │
│                                                     │
│  PostgreSQL database (external, configured in       │
│  conf/database.conf)                                │
└─────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘

Directory Layout

cohesive-cmdbuild-dev/
├── README.md                  # This file
├── setup.sh                   # One-time bootstrap
├── dev-deploy.sh              # Daily build & deploy
├── docker-compose.yml         # Tomcat container config
├── conf/
│   ├── database.conf.example  # Template
│   └── database.conf          # Your config (git-ignored)
├── source/                    # CMDBuild source (git-ignored, created by setup.sh)
├── war-builder/               # cohesive-cmdbuild-builder (git-ignored, created by setup.sh)
└── webapp/                    # Exploded WAR (git-ignored, created by setup.sh)

Module Map

The dev-deploy script auto-discovers Maven modules by scanning pom.xml files. Common modules:

Source Directory	Description
dao/postgresql	Database access layer (PostgreSQL)
dao/core	Core DAO interfaces
core/all	Core business logic
auth/login	Authentication
ui/auto	UI auto-generation

Run ./dev-deploy.sh -s to see all discovered modules and which ones have changes.

Configuration

Docker Resources

Override Tomcat JVM settings via CATALINA_OPTS:

export CATALINA_OPTS="-Xms512m -Xmx2g"
docker compose up -d

Container User

The container runs as your host user (via UID/GID env vars) so file permissions work correctly. The scripts set these automatically.

Troubleshooting

Container won't start

docker compose logs -f          # Check Tomcat logs
docker compose ps               # Check container status

"READY" never appears

• First-time startup can be slow while CMDBuild initializes the database schema
• Check conf/database.conf - is the database reachable from Docker (remember: network_mode: host)?
• Check PostgreSQL logs for connection errors

Build fails

cd source
mvn package -pl dao/postgresql -am -Dmaven.test.skip=true
# Read the full Maven error output

JAR deployed but changes not visible

Some changes require a Tomcat restart:

./dev-deploy.sh -r

Full reset

docker compose down
docker volume rm cohesive-cmdbuild-dev_cmdbuild_logs cohesive-cmdbuild-dev_cmdbuild_work
rm -rf webapp
./dev-deploy.sh -f

Related Projects

• cohesive-cmdbuild-builder - Docker-based WAR build system
• cohesive-cmdbuild - CMDBuild source fork

License

AGPL v3 - see LICENSE