Erlang Programming Exercise 12-3: The Database Server as an Application

First create an OTP Application directory structure. The work flow resembles something like the following if you’re on UNIX.

cd ~/work/erlang
mkdir ~/work/erlang/chapter12/{src,ebin,include,priv}
cp db_server_otp.erl db_server_sup.erl ~/work/erlang/chapter12/src
cd ~/work/erlang/chapter12/src
erlc *.erl
mv *.beam ../ebin

With the source code and BEAM files ready, now create an app file, db_server_app.erl:

-module(db_server_app).
-export([start/2,stop/1]).
-behavior(application).

start(_Type, _StartArgs) ->
    db_server_sup:start().

stop(_State) ->
    ok.

Compile this code and then move the BEAM file to the ebin folder. Create an application resource file describing the application, db_server.app in the ebin folder:

{application,
 db_server,
 [{description, "Erlang Prgramming Ch. 12 DB Server"},
  {vsn, "1.0"},
  {modules, [db_server_otp, db_server_sup, db_server_app]},
  {registered, [db_server_sup]},
  {applications, [kernel, stdlib]},
  {env, []},
  {mod, {db_server_app, []}}
 ]
}.

The final directory structure should look like this:

~/work/erlang/chapter12$ ls -1
ebin
include
priv
src
~/work/erlang/chapter12$ ls -1 ebin
db_server.app
db_server_app.beam
db_server_otp.beam
db_server_sup.beam
~/work/erlang/chapter12$ ls -1 src
db_server_app.erl
db_server_otp.erl
db_server_sup.erl

With the BEAM files and app files in the ebin directory, the application can now be tested with the Erlang shell.

Erlang R13B03 (erts-5.7.4)  [64-bit] [smp:8:2] [rq:8] [async-threads:0] [hipe] [kernel-poll:false]
Eshell V5.7.4  (abort with ^G)
1> code:add_path("/home/bryan/work/erlang/chapter12/ebin").
true
2> application:start(db_server).
ok
3> db_server_otp:write("Ted", "7").
ok
4> db_server_otp:read("Ted").
{ok,"7"}
5> application:stop(db_server).
ok

=INFO REPORT==== 3-Nov-2011::16:32:08 ===
    application: db_server
    exited: stopped
    type: temporary
6> whereis(db_server_sup).
undefined

Success! (Note: this was much easier than the first time I tried to get a Tomcat servlet working…)

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