Many clients wish to know what the hardware and operating system requirements are for a Delft-FEWS live system. On this page you can find a list of specifications. If you have any question about the list, or you do not see the operating system of your choice: please contact us. This list is not exhaustive.

Operator clients
The Operator Client (Gui) is the thick client for end users.

• normal pc
• minimum 512 MB RAM, 1GB recommended
• operating system: Windows 7 / 8, Server 2008 / 2012(R2), Linux RedHat / CentOS / SUSE
• amount needed: as many as there are clients
• usable in Citrix
• users run with their own log on credential, no admin privileges required

Forecasting Shell Server
The Forecasting Shell Server is the server for execution of forecast runs. It contains the modelling software and it's operation is controlled by the Master Controller

• minimum 2 GB RAM
• one CPU core per FSS instance,
• CPU typically Intel Xeon 2.33 GHz or equivalent.
• operating system: Windows 7 / 8, Server 2008 / 2012(R2), Linux RedHat / CentOS / SUSE contains modelling software (incl. licenses), OS usually dependent on 3rd party modules and modelling software
• recommended minimum 2, add more depending on computational load
• Windows and linux forecasting shells can be used simultaneously

Master Controller Server
The master controller organises task traffic and scheduling

• minimum 1 GB RAM per Master Controller instance
• CPU typically Intel Xeon 2.33 GHz or equivalent.
• operating system: Windows 7 / 8, Server 2008 / 2012(R2), Linux RedHat / CentOS / SUS. Other Unix-like operating systems are possible (e.g. HP-UX, Solaris), as long as there is a Java JRE with the correct version available for the OS.

JMS Server

Java Messaging Service (JMS) controls a large part of the communication between the components.

• minimum 1GB RAM per JMS instance
• minimum 1GB disk space for caching purposes:
• CPU typically Intel Xeon 2.33 GHz or equivalent
• operating system: Windows 7 / 8, Server 2008 / 2012(R2), Linux RedHat / CentOS / SUSE
• Supported JMS Servers: JBoss 4, JBoss 5, AcitveMQ 5.11 (as of release 2015.02 default JMS)

This component can often be installed on the same server as the Master Controller.

Central Database
This is the central data repository, linked to the master controller. The live system is known to run with the following database versions:

• Oracle 10 / 11 / 12
• MS SQL Server 2008 / 2008R2 / 2012 / 2014

• PostgreSQL 9.3 / 9.4 / 9.5 / 9.6 (9.6 is supported from 2016.01 onwards)

This list is not exhaustive, so contact us if you are thinking of using a different database or a different type.

• advised internal memory and CPU: See Database vendor requirements. Typically 1 GB RAM per DB instance and CPU Intel Xeon 2.33 GHz or equivalent.
• The database instance(s) can be a hosted on an existing database server or cluster.
• uses 1 instance for each Master controller

Webserver
The webserver is an optional server that hosts and distributes the webpages generated by Delft-FEWS. Hardware requirements depend on the intended use.

PiService
This is an optional service which allows SOAP clients to interact with and retrieve data from the FEWS system. Hardware requirements depend on the intended use. In general it is not recommended to have the PiService on the same machine as the master-controller / MQ server.

Requirements overview

All activities contribute to resource consumption on a computing box, whether that box is hardware or virtual and Delft-FEWS will consume resources when running.

Scalability, number of servers

The components mentioned above can all be located on one (powerful) server or each on an individual machine, with all possible configurations in between. It is however common practice to separate the Forecasting Shell server from the Master-controller server. When using multiple machines it is essential that all machines have matching clocks. This can be achieved by making use of one and the same ntp server.

A typical configuration is:

• Master Controller server running Master Controller(s), Application Server (JBoss or Weblogic), Apache Tomcat for Admin Interface and Archive Server
• Database Server
• Forecasting Shell Server(s)

Typically in a dual master-controller setup every master-controller has its own machine so that maintenance can take place without offline time.

Virtualization

It is possible to deploy the master-controller components / forecasting shells in virtualized environments. It is recommended to contact the Delft-FEWS product management beforehand so that they may advise on virtualization options. The Deltares ICT team has most experience with Delft-FEWS on VMWare VSphere with in-depth knowledge but Delft-FEWS is also known to run on Microsoft Hyper-V. Virtualization of the Delft-FEWS back-end services can generally be done without problems. Best practice is to build small appliances so that the Master Controller, MQ Server (Jboss / ActiveMQ) and Tomcat Servlet Engine (Admin Interface) all have their separate virtual machines. This setup guarantees the individual components do not compete for the same resources such as CPU and memory. Virtualization of the Forecasting Shells is currently not recommended for heavy computational models. When using virtualization, for every logical Forecasting shell there should be a separate virtual forecasting shell server. The number of virtual processor cores issued should never exceed the number of physical cores for forecasting shells.

Grid computing

FEWS can work with grid computing. Especially when working with heavy computations, e.g. ensemble forecasting or 3d hydraulic computing this can be an interesting option to explore. It is recommended to contact the Delft-FEWS product management beforehand.

Java JRE versions

Note that for security reasons, java should never be installed inside a browser. Delft-FEWS should only be using the java JRE in embedded form.

Since 2014.01 Delft-FEWS requires a base-build. This base-build requires a (minimal) jre-version. See the table below. For 2015.01, 2015.02 and 2016.01 with Java JRE 8 upgrades above _100, a new base-build is required.

Java JRE versions for JMS providers

Windows VC-Redistributables

The Delft-FEWS software contains Windows executables requiring a VC++ Redistributable Package being installed.