Breif notes for those that need to install Tomcat as a stand alone webserver - hopefully it'll help someone avoid the pitfalls(!) This is specific to the configuration I've followed - though I have tried this with RH9 and SuSE8.1 and it works fine. Note - I did not have apache (or any other web server installed; this is purely a Tomcat web server install)
1. Aquire a copy of the java SDK from:
http://java.sun.com/j2se/1.4.1/download.html
I used the 1.4 SDK binary. Download j2sdk-1_4_1_03-linux-i586.bin from the site and save in your chosen install directory - I used /usr/local/.
2. chmod 755 j2sdk-1_4_1_03-linux-i586.bin and execute the file. There's a huge disclamer from sun - tab through, accept, and let the SDK install. It will install to /usr/local/j2sdk1.4.1_03.
3. Create an env variable JAVA_HOME=/usr/local/j2sdk1.4.1_03 (or whatever direcotry the SDK is installed to).
4. export JAVA_HOME
5. Download the tomcat binary from
http://jakarta.apache.org/site/binindex.cgi
I chose Tomcat 4.1.24 which is the most recent at time of writing from ./bin/jakarta-tomcat-4.1.24-LE-jdk14.tar.gz - choose the LE version (light version) for java 1.4.X. Download, again, to /usr/local
6. gunzip jakarta-tomcat-4.1.24-LE-jdk14.tar.gz
7. tar -xvf jakarta-tomcat-4.1.24-LE-jdk14.tar
8. cd /usr/local/jakarta-tomcat-4.1.24-LE-jdk14/bin
9. ./startup.sh
10. From a web browser,
http://localhost:8080 to view the default tomcat page.
To configure with apache, see a quick guide at
http://www.johnturner.com/howto/rh72-howto.html