vert.x

Installation Guide

Before you can do anything with vert.x you need to install it, so let's describe how to do that.

Getting a distro


The easiest way to get hold of a distribution is to download a binary distro. Alternatively you can build from source. To do that see the instructions on the github wiki.

Pre-requisites


  • Operating System. Vert.x runs out of the box on Linux, OSX or Windows.

  • JDK. Vert.x requires JDK 1.7.0 or later. You can use the official Oracle distribution or the OpenJDK version. Make sure the JDK bin directory is on your PATH.

  • JRuby. If you want to use Ruby with Vert.x you will need to have installed JRuby and have the JRUBY_HOME environment variable pointing at the base of your JRuby installation. You will also need to install the json Ruby Gem since this is used in Vert.x. You can do this by running jruby -S gem install json. If you're not using Ruby in Vert.x you don't need any of this.

  • Jython. If you want to use Python with Vert.x you will need to have installed Jython and have the JYTHON_HOME environment variable pointing at the base of your Jython installation. If you're not using Jython in Vert.x you don't need any of this.

Install vert.x


Once you've got the pre-requisites installed, you install vert.x as follows:

  1. Unzip the distro somewhere sensible (e.g. your home directory)
  2. Add the vert.x bin directory to your PATH.

Check the version


To make sure you've installed it correctly, open another console and type:

tim@Ethel:~/example$ vertx version
vert.x 1.3.1.final

You should see output something like the above.

Testing the install


Let's test the install by writing a simple web server.

Copy the following into a text editor and save it as server.js

load('vertx.js');

vertx.createHttpServer().requestHandler(function(req) {
  req.response.end("Hello World!");
}).listen(8080, 'localhost');

Open a console in the directory where you saved it, and type:

vertx run server.js

Open your browser and point it at http://localhost:8080

If you see "Hello World!" in the browser then you're all set to go!