How to Restart Thingworx Composer hosted by PTC

[mariaSutton]

Are there any Thingworx Extension developers out there who do not have direct access to there Thingworx (non-prod) server?

Our servers are hosted by the PTC Cloud team, so we do not have direct access to the backend.
It is not uncommon to be prompted to restart the Thingworx server when trying to import an extension.

Cloud Direct offers "Self-Service" features, one being Restart Application. This would be a great feature for this issue, if it worked for all environments.

Currently none of the Self-Service features work for our development environment (I am not sure if this affects other Cloud Direct users).  We have a case open about this issue and until it is resolved we have to open a new case for each server restart. 
I am curious how other TWX Extension developers handle restarting their TWX dev environments. 

TIA for sharing!

[Rocko]

As far as I know, as a cloud customer you are entitled to run local dev environments as well, and that is what I would do - create a local instance, either on-prem or directly on your machine. Then you can decide if you want to restart the whole tomcat or just the Thingworx App via Tomcat Web Application Manager.

[mariaSutton]

Thanks for your response @Rocko!

Do you recall if installing this local dev environment was something you could install yourself or did it require assistance from PTC? 
If you were able to do this yourself, can you point to the install docs? 

Also, does this instance vary in configuration compared to the cloud environment?

I really appreciate your help!

[Rocko]

Hi Maria, you can do the installation yourself, you will need a database, Tomcat, and Thingworx. TWX comes with an installer nowadays which you can try or go via the manuall install route. Both is documented in the product help for your version, e.g. here: https://support.ptc.com/help/thingworx/platform/r9/en/#page/ThingWorx/Help/Installation/InstallingThingWorx.html#

There is an unsupported alternative for a more lightweight installation here: https://github.com/ptc-iot-sharing/ThingworxPortableScripts

Configuration variation is hard to tell, since we don't know your config in PTC Cloud. You won't have SSO, Analytics and Integration Runtime, which are optional components in your local installation, not sure if that is needed for the development of your extension. Also memory, CPU is different.

But first, please validate with your PTC seller that your contract really allows for those local dev licenses. Then align with them on how to get a licence. This is the part where you need PTC, your installation comes only with a small temp license and you need to provide a real one.