S1 - All Components, Multi-Machine (Windows)

Overview

This guide covers installing the full CAST Imaging suite across multiple Microsoft Windows machines. Each component group is installed on a dedicated host.

What is installed:

When to use: Production environments. Components can be distributed to match your infrastructure and scale analysis capacity by adding multiple analysis-node machines.

Requirements

Read and understand the following before starting:

• Hardware requirements
• Software requirements
• Database requirements
• Disk space requirements

Before you start

1. Install the database: Install PostgreSQL on a dedicated machine (or reuse an existing instance) accessible from all component machines. See Database server install for instructions.

2. Install CAST Imaging Core: CAST Imaging Core ≥ 8.4 is required on every machine where analysis-node will be installed. Download and install it on those machines before running the CAST Imaging installer:

   • Download: com.castsoftware.imaging.core 
   • Installation instructions: Installing CAST Imaging Core

3. Extend Local Server: If your environment does not permit access to CAST Extend  over the internet, you will need to install the Extend Local Server separately before completing this guide.

4. Network connectivity: All machines must be able to communicate with each other over the network. Before starting, confirm:

   • All machines can reach the imaging-services machine
   • All machines can reach the database instance
   • All required ports listed in Hardware requirements are open inbound on each machine

Step 1 - Download the installation media on each machine

On each machine where you will install a component download the latest release of com.castsoftware.imaging.console  from CAST Extend and unzip it anywhere on the local disk.

The following files and folders will be created:

• tools/ (folder)
• cast-imaging-install.bat
• cast-imaging-remove.bat
• cast-imaging-update.bat
• components-installers.zip
• config-all.conf
• config-imaging-services.conf
• config-analysis-node.conf
• config-imaging-viewer.conf
• config-dashboards.conf

Step 2 - Configure the installation on each machine

On each machine, open the appropriate *.conf file and update the installation variables. Shared variable values must be consistent across all machines.

Hostname variables

Each *.conf file contains hostname variables that must point to the correct machines. Use the FQDN or static IP address of each machine (not localhost or simple hostnames).

LICENSE_KEY and EXTEND_API_KEY (optional)

To avoid being prompted for the global license key and CAST Extend API key on first login, you can pre-configure these variables in config-imaging-services.conf:

LICENSE_KEY=<your-license-key>
EXTEND_API_KEY=<your-extend-api-key>

CAST_INSTALLATION_CONF (optional)

By default, the installer stores installation properties in:

%PROGRAMDATA%\CAST\CAST\.install

To use a different location, set the CAST_INSTALLATION_CONF Windows system environment variable to your preferred folder path on each machine before running the installer.

Domain mapping (optional, imaging-services machine)

To isolate imaging-viewer results per domain in dedicated Neo4j databases, you can enable the domain/tenant mapping feature. CAST strongly recommends enabling this now, before any applications are onboarded - enabling it later in an existing installation causes irreversible loss of customizations (tags, saved views, post-it notes, custom objects).

Before running the installer (on the imaging-services machine for multi-machine deployments), create a Windows system environment variable:

• Variable name: IMAGING_DOMAIN_SYNCHRO_ENABLED
• Variable value: true

See Domain/tenant mapping feature for full details and prerequisites.

Firewall ports

Open all ports listed in Hardware requirements inbound on each machine to ensure:

• Users can access all CAST Imaging resources in their browser
• CAST Imaging components can communicate with each other correctly

Step 3 - Run the installation (in order)

On each machine, open a CMD window with elevated permissions (right-click, Run as administrator) and run the appropriate command from the root of the unzipped files. Install in the following order, waiting for each component to be fully running before proceeding.

On the imaging-services machine - install first:

cast-imaging-install.bat package=imaging-services

On the imaging-viewer machine:

cast-imaging-install.bat package=imaging-viewer

On each analysis-node machine:

cast-imaging-install.bat package=analysis-node

On the dashboards machine:

cast-imaging-install.bat package=dashboards

Step 4 - Verify the installation

On each machine, check that the expected Windows Services are running:

The full list of services installed:

Step 5 - Initial startup configuration

Browse to:

http://<IMAGING_SERVICES_HOSTNAME>:8090

Log in using the default credentials: admin / admin

Configure the Licensing strategy. Choose one of:

• Named Application - each onboarded application requires its own dedicated license key
• Contributing Developers - a global license key based on the number of contributing developers

Configure CAST Extend settings and Proxy settings:

Verify that all components are available:

http://<IMAGING_SERVICES_HOSTNAME>:8090/admin/services

Step 6 - Configure authentication

Out-of-the-box, CAST Imaging uses Local Authentication (admin/admin) managed by Keycloak.

CAST recommends switching to your enterprise authentication system (LDAP or SAML) before onboarding applications. Access the Keycloak UI using the kcadmin account (or the value of KEYCLOAK_LOGIN_ADMIN_USER if customized during installation). See Authentication for full instructions.

Next steps

• Configure HTTPS access
• Configure a reverse proxy