When you install Tomcat using apt-get on Ubuntu, its root folder will be in /var/lib/tomcat7Inside of it, there will be some folders and symbolic linkswork -> ../../cache/tomcat7logs -> ../../log/tomcat7conf -> /etc/tomcat7sharedservercommontempwebappsFolders bin and lib will be in /usr/share/tomcat7Following the install process described in Installing Liferay on Tomcat 7 you will see, in the first sentence:Liferay Home is one folder above Tomcats install location.If you start Liferay without changing anything, just like the tutorial says, Liferay will create its folders in the Liferay Home, which is, by default, /var/lib/.Having application data folders inside /var/lib is not a good idea, just like Dave Kliczbor commented on the comments section on that page.In order to "fix" that behaviour, create the file /var/lib/tomcat7/webapps/ROOT/WEB-INF/classes/portal-ext.properties and add the lineliferay.home=/var/lib/tomcat7Create the folders /var/lib/tomcat7/data and /var/lib/tomcat7/deploy and make them writeable for the user tomcat7 runningsudo chown -R tomcat7:tomcat7 /var/lib/tomcat7/datasudo chown -R tomcat7:tomcat7 /var/lib/tomcat7/deployThat's enough to have your Liferay server ready to run. When you download and install the trial version of Alfresco Activiti, you get a functional server, ready to be used for tests, but the database is configured to use H2.If you want to play with it in a more production like environment, the ideal is to have it connected to a "real" database.In my case, I'm running this Activiti instance in the same server I already have an Alfresco for development, which is already connected to a local PostgreSQL server.Because of that, I decided to configure Activiti to use PostgreSQL too.The required steps are easy, and are available in the official documentation here https://docs.alfresco.com/activiti/docs/admin-guide/1.5.0/What I'm going to do here is to provide an as easy to follow step by step procedure to make it work as quick as possible.Getting the installerIn order to get the installer, you have to fill in a form at https://www.alfresco.com/products/bpm/alfresco-activiti/trialYou will receive an email containing all the links you need to get the installer, the trial license and also links for some documentation pages.Download the installer you want to use (On this blog post, I'm going to use the Linux version. If you are using another option, you will have to adapt the paths accordingly)Do not forget to download the license too, or you will not be able to use Activiti.Install ActivitiFor the sake of simplicity, I used the default options presented by the installer, so I'm going going to describe them here. Simply execute the installer as followchmod +x activiti-1.5.0-linux-x64-installer.runsudo ./activiti-1.5.0-linux-x64-installer.runInstall the license filecd /opt/activiti/tomcat/libsudo cp ~/activiti.lic .Install the PostgreSQL JDBC drivercd /opt/activiti/tomcat/libsudo wget https://jdbc.postgresql.org/download/postgresql-9.4.1211.jre6.jarCreate a new PostgreSQL databasesudo -u postgres createdb -O alfresco activitiConfigure Activiti to use the created databasecd /opt/activiti/tomcat/libsudo vim activiti-app.propertiesComment the lines belowdatasource.driver=org.h2.Driverdatasource.url=jdbc:h2:tcp://localhost:9092/activitihibernate.dialect=org.hibernate.dialect.H2DialectAnd then uncomment these onesdatasource.driver=org.postgresql.Driverdatasource.url=jdbc:postgresql://localhost:5432/activitihibernate.dialect=org.hibernate.dialect.PostgreSQLDialectdatasource.preferred-test-query=select 1That's all.TestingStart Activiti using the start-activiti.sh script.If everything is right, you should be able to access the Activiti console going to http://server:8080/activiti-appUse the default credentials to connect: admin@app.activiti.com with password admin. It's possible to debug your Java code using Alfresco SDK 2.1.In order to do that, make a copy of the run.sh script and rename it to debug.sh.Edit the debug.sh file and change the last line like this:MAVEN_OPTS="-javaagent:$springloadedfile -noverify -Xms256m -Xmx2G