Solr and Tomcat installation should offer more standard/flexible options.

[kfogel]

Right now, Tomcat and Solr are distributed with Checkbook in essentially binary form (compiled Java JAR files).

This is because it is faster for developers who are less experienced with Tomcat and Solr to get started this way. But in theory, it is entirely up to the admin to choose to run Solr using one of the many possible application servers (Tomcat is just the default we currently recommend and use in production). It is possible to run Solr under many advanced configurations, and this is independent of Checkbook functionality.

So the choice is really on the one who is implementing Solr. If they have sufficient expertise in Solr they could, in theory, go ahead and set it up in their own way.

But the installation documentation should reflect this more clearly. And we might want to consider not shipping Tomcat and Solr with Checkbook directly, but instead offer them (in their current pre-packaged form) as a separate download, and in the installation documentation just mention the possibility of simply using that download as an easy option available to those who are not experienced setting up Solr already.