Run TIBCO FTL® Locally

note

The local installation for TIBCO FTL is supported on Linux and Windows machines (x86_64). If you are using another operating system, it is recommended that you use the Docker-based quickstart.

Prerequisites

Before you start, you'll need:

• The latest version of TIBCO FTL package (enterprise edition) for your operating system (e.g, TIB_ftl_7.3.0_linux_x86_64.zip)
• (Optional) A valid TIBCO FTL license file

Installing FTL

Linux

Extract the TIBCO FTL archive file and navigate into the extracted TIB_ftl_7.3.0 directory.

unzip TIB_ftl_7.3.0_linux_x86_64.zip
cd TIB_ftl_7.3.0

You can then install TIBCO FTL using one of these commands, depending on the Linux platform variant.

Red Hat/Centos/Fedora

sudo yum install -y rpm/*.rpm

Debian/Ubuntu

sudo dpkg -i deb/*.deb

SUSE

sudo zypper install rpm/*.rpm

Other

for f in tar/*; do tar zxfv $f; done

tip

You must have root privileges to write to the root (/) directory.

Windows

To install TIBCO FTL on a windows platform, ensure that the .NET framework is properly installed and up to date. Then, double-click on the FTL installation package icon. Once completed, TIBCO FTL is installed in C:\tibco\ftl\7.3. If the .NET framework is properly installed, then installing TIBCO FTL automatically registers the FTL libraries with the Windows GAC.

Running the FTL Server

Go to the temporary directory and set the license environment vairable to preview_mode, then start the FTL server on a port of your choosing.

tip

The preview_mode lets you run TIBCO FTL without a license for 6 hours. If you have a valid TIBCO FTL license, you may replace preview_mode with the absolute path to your license file.

Linux

cd /tmp
export TIBFTL_LICENSE="preview_mode"
/opt/tibco/ftl/7.3/bin/tibftlserver -n default@localhost:8585

Then in a separate terminal:

/opt/tibco/ftl/7.3/samples/load-samples-config http://localhost:8585

Windows

cd %TMP%
set TIBFTL_LICENSE=preview_mode
C:\tibco\ftl\7.3\bin\tibftlserver.exe -n default@localhost:8585

Then in a separate terminal:

C:\tibco\ftl\7.3\samples\load-samples-config.bat http://localhost:8585

We can then verify that the FTL server has started. The curl command should give the following response:

Linux

curl -si localhost:8585/api/v1/available

Windows

curl -si localhost:8585/api/v1/available

HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Content-Length: 0
Date: Thu, 12 Feb 2026 22:05:49 GMT
X-Xss-Protection: 1; mode=block

Once started, the FTL server user interface will be available at http://localhost:8585.

Run the Sample Applications

Now that the FTL server is running, you can run the FTL sample applications. The following commands will run sample applications that publish and subscribe to a topic named quickstart.topic. To run them, open two different terminal windows, one for the FTL subscriber and one for the FTL publisher and then execute the following commands.

Linux

Terminal 1 - Start the subscriber

/opt/tibco/ftl/7.3/samples/bin/advanced/tibftldest-recv -d quickstart.topic -c 10

Terminal 2 - Start the publisher

/opt/tibco/ftl/7.3/samples/bin/advanced/tibftldest-send -d quickstart.topic -c 10

Windows

Terminal 1 - Start the subscriber

C:\tibco\ftl\7.3\samples\bin\advanced\tibftldest-recv.exe -d quickstart.topic -c 10

Terminal 2 - Start the publisher

C:\tibco\ftl\7.3\samples\bin\advanced\tibftldest-send.exe -d quickstart.topic -c 10

We can use the tibftldest-thru-recv and tibftldest-thru-send samples to measure the throughput between a publisher and a subscriber on the topic performance.topic. These samples will send 500,000 messages and display the throughput measurements:

Linux

Terminal 1 - Start the subscriber

/opt/tibco/ftl/7.3/samples/bin/advanced/tibftldest-thru-recv -d performance.topic

Terminal 2 - Start the publisher

/opt/tibco/ftl/7.3/samples/bin/advanced/tibftldest-thru-send -d performance.topic

Windows

Terminal 1 - Start the subscriber

C:\tibco\ftl\7.3\samples\bin\advanced\tibftldest-thru-recv.exe -d performance.topic

Terminal 2 - Start the publisher

C:\tibco\ftl\7.3\samples\bin\advanced\tibftldest-thru-send.exe -d performance.topic

The output will be a report of the throughput metrics with the format:

Sending 100 warmup message(s)
Requested        500,000 messages.
Sending        500,000 messages (500 batches of 1000) with payload size 16
...

TIBCO FTL offers a large variety of samples for different messaging patterns...

Some other samples to explore are:

Publisher	Subscriber	Description
tibftldest-map-set	tibftldest-map-get	Basic program that sets/gets a message to from a map using the destinations messaging model.
tibftldest-queue-send	tibftldest-queue-recv	Basic program that sends/receives a message to a queue using the destinations messaging model.

Use the --help flag to see the other options available for each sample.

Monitor Your Server

While the FTL server is running, you can access the FTL server user interface at http://localhost:8585 to monitor:

• Active clients and connections
• Destinations and stores
• Server health and metrics

You can also use the FTL REST API to gather JSON-formatted information. For instance, to gather monitoring information:

Linux

curl http://localhost:8585/api/v1/server

Windows

curl http://localhost:8585/api/v1/server

To see the REST API documentation, visit http://localhost:8585/api/docs/.

Stop the FTL Server

If the server is running in the foreground, press Ctrl+C in the terminal running tibftlserver. Otherwise, terminate the process directly:

Linux

pkill tibftlserver

Windows

taskkill /IM tibftlserver.exe /F

Next Steps

For additional information:

• Browse the various samples offered and examine different messaging patterns.
• Check the TIBCO FTL documentation for advanced configuration and concepts.