As of September 2017, Tomcat 9 is at the alpha stage, not a stable release. So We are going to install Tomcat 8.5.11.

Step 1: Download and Install Tomcat 8

• Goto http://tomcat.apache.org ⇒ Under Downloads ⇒ Under “Tomcat 8” ⇒ Binary Distributions ⇒ Core ⇒ Click on “ZIP” package (e.g. you will get “apache-tomcat-8.5.20.zip”, about 9 MB).
• Create your server directory into day drive, say “c:\servers” , “d:\servers” or “e:\servers”. UNZIP the downloaded file into your server directory. Tomcat will be unzipped into directory e.g., “e:\servers\apache-tomcat-8.0.20”.
• For ease of use, we shall shorten and rename this directory to “e:\servers\tomcat8”.

Note : e:\servers\tomcat8 is tomcat install home directory

Step 2: Create an Environment Variable JAVA_HOME

You need to create an environment variable called “JAVA_HOME” and set it to your JDK installed directory.

• First, find your JDK installed directory. The default is “c:\Program Files\Java\jdk1.8.0_{xx}”. memorize of your JDK installed directory or copy paste into somewhere.
• To set the environment variable JAVA_HOME in Windows 7/8/10: Start “Control Panel” ⇒ System and Security (Optional) ⇒ System ⇒ Advanced system settings ⇒ Switch to “Advanced” tab ⇒ Environment Variables ⇒ System Variables ⇒ “New” ⇒ In “Variable Name”, enter “JAVA_HOME” ⇒ In “Variable Value”, enter your JDK installed directory as copied or noted in previous step.

STEP 3: Configure Tomcat Server

The Tomcat configuration files are located in the “conf” sub-directory of your Tomcat installed directory, e.g. “e:\servers\tomcat8\conf”. There are 4 configuration XML files:

Step 3(1): “conf\server.xml” – Set the TCP Port Number

• Use a any programming text editor (e.g., NotePad++, TextPad, Sublime, Atom) to open the configuration file “server.xml”, under the “conf” sub-directory of Tomcat installed directory.
• The default TCP port number configured in Tomcat is 8080, you may choose any number between 1024 and 65535, which is not used by an existing application. We shall choose 2017 in this article. (For a production server, you should use default port number 80, which is pre-assigned to HTTP server.)
• Locate the following lines (around Line 69) that define the HTTP connector, and change port=”8080″ to port=”2017″.

Step 3(b): “conf\web.xml” – Enabling Directory Listing

• Again, use a programming text editor to open the configuration file “web.xml”, under the “conf” sub-directory of Tomcat installed directory.
• We shall enable directory listing by changing “listings” from “false” to “true” for the “default” servlet. This is handy for a test system, but due to security reasons not for a production system.
• Locate the following lines (around Line 103) that define the “default” servlet, and change the “listings” from “false” to “true”.

Step 3(c): “conf\context.xml” – Enabling Automatic Reload

• We shall add the attribute reloadable=”true” to the element to enable automatic reload after code changes. Again, this is handy for test system but not for production, due to the overhead of detecting changes.
• Locate the “Context” start element (around Line 19), and change it to given below.

Step 3(d): (Optional) “conf\tomcat-users.xml”

• Enable the Tomcat’s manager by adding the below code:

STEP 4: Start Tomcat Server

• The Tomcat’s executable programs and scripts are kept in the “bin” sub-directory of the Tomcat installed directory, e.g., “e:\servers\tomcat8\bin”
• Launch a CMD shell. Set the current directory to “\bin” e.g. “e:\servers\tomcat8\bin
• Run “startup.bat”

Step 5: Shutdown Server
You can shutdown the tomcat server by either:

• Press Ctrl-C on the Tomcat console; OR
• Run “\bin\shutdown.bat” script.