Deployment automation support

The product supports fully automated deployment. It means that it can be installed and configured with no human interaction.After installing MetaDefender ICAP Server for the first time (clean install), it requires you to go through wizard steps to accept EULA, create a default local admin user, and optionally import configrations. Those steps could be automated using ignition file described in this page.

The automated deployment can be split to three steps on a high level:

1. Installation
2. Initialization
3. Configuration

Installation

To automate the installation, install the product from the command line and provide the installation-time options as parameters to the installer. For further details see $link[page,408692,auto$]

After the installation is complete, the product starts up and waits in a pre-initialized status. The product may be initialized in two ways:

1. Manually using the wizard or command line
2. Automatically using an ignition file (see below).

Initialization

Initialization is the process of bringing the product to an operable status.

Basically the initialization consists of the following steps:

1. Accept the End User License Agreement (EULA),
2. Import product configuration and
3. Create the first administrator user account.

Ignition file

The initialization process can be configured in a file called the ignition file.

The ignition file must be in conf format

Ignition file fields

The ignition file must have the following fields:

Ignition file location

The directory of the ignition file is configurable:

Detailed initialization process

1. After the product has been started, it looks for the ignition file in the configured (or default) location.
2. If an ignition file is found, then
   1. It gets validated, and if it is valid, then
      1. Based on the information found in the ignition file:
      2. The EULA is accepted,
      3. The configuration is imported,
      4. The administrator account is created.
      5. If any of the above steps fails, then the error is logged, and the initialization gets terminated.

2. If it is not valid, then the error is logged, and the initialization gets terminated.

3. If there is no ignition file, then no initialization is performed.

Configuration

After the initialization is complete, the product is ready with the default and the imported configuration.