Manually reloading the configuration

We will now perform a simple change on GeoServer's configuration to demonstrate the reload configuration function. Consider the following steps:

1. To use the reload function, we want to manually edit the setting in the XML files contained in the GeoServer data directory, and, in particular, the global.xml, containing information about the administrator. If you didn't change its location, you may find it in the default location at, {TOMCAT_HOME}/webapps/geoserver/data, as in the following example:

        $ sudo vi /opt/apache-tomcat-8.5.13/webapps/geoserver/data/
          global.xml

1. As you scroll down the content of the file, you should find the contact tag. Fill it with your details. Note that not all of the following XML tag may be present, but you may insert it, paying attention to the syntax:

       <contact> 
         <address>via Roma 115</address> 
         <addressCity>Roma</addressCity> 
         <addressCountry>Italy</addressCountry> 
         <addressType>Work</addressType> 
         <contactEmail>stefano.iacovella@gmail.com</contactEmail> 
         <contactOrganization>Packt Publishing Ltd.</contactOrganization> 
         <contactPerson>Stefano Iacovella</contactPerson> 
         <contactPosition>Chief geographer</contactPosition> 
       </contact> 

1. Now save the file and close it. Then go to the web interface; in the About & Status panel, click on the Server Status menu link to display the GeoServer status, scroll down, and click on the Reload button.
2. Now, go to the Contact Information panel. It shows your updated information.

We explored a simple case to use the reload configuration function. This is very useful in case you have to update a remote server with an automatic procedure, or you configure more GeoServer instances sharing the same configuration. We will explore such deployment options in Chapter 11, Tuning GeoServer in a Production Environment.