In this article we are going to see what are the minimum requirement for Adobe CQ5 installation/ Adobe AEM Installation and step wise explanation of installation process of AEM/CQ5. If you are looking for how to start AEM server in debug mode or what are the various interfaces or console available in AEM then this tutorial is targeted for you.

Minimum System Requirement for Installing Adobe CQ5 or AEM Author and Publish instances are:-

• A Valid Cq5 or AEM quick start jar.
• A Valid license key(license.properties).
• The Java Development Kit JDK version 1.5 and above.
• The Java Runtime Environment (JRE). Version 1.7 is preferred.
• 3 GB free hard disk drive space.
• At least 1.5 GB of RAM.

Steps for Adobe CQ5 or AEM Installation:-

• Create a folder in C or D drive with name author that will contain 3 files. CQ-quickstart jar file, License key file and the quickstart folder that will be created during installation of CQ.
  Note: There should not be any spaces in the names, this can lead to error.
  

Rename the AEM or CQ jar to cq-author-4502.jar:-

• cq refers to the adobe communique application name(you can use any name over here)
• author refers to the WCM mode we want to use (eg. author or publish)
• 4502 refers to the port that we want to use for running cq.

Note:- If no port number is provided in the file name, AEM6.0 will select the first available port from
the following list: 1) 4502, 2) 8080, 3) 8081, 4) 8082, 5) 8083, 6) 8084, 7) 8085, 8) 8888, 9)
9362, 10) random.

• Copy and paste the author folder on the same path, parallel to author folder and rename it to publish.
  Navigate to the “Publish” folder and rename the jar file as cq-publish-4503.jar.
  Note:- we can use any free port,but preferable is 4503 for publish instance and 4502 port for author instance.)
• Double click on respective cq-<author/publish>-<4502/4503>.jar, for starting the instance in author/publish  mode. This will take around 5-10  minutes depending upon your system specification to start the instance.
  Note:- Many times my CQ crashes due to low memory, to avoid this create a bat file(start.bat) in author/publish folder and write the below code into it. Instead of double clicking on CQ file now double click on this BAT file to start the server.Replace the CQ jar file name by your file name in bat file.
  • If you are using 32 bit VM:

    java -Xmx1024M -jar cq5-author-4502.jar

  • If you are using 64 bit VM:

• java -XX:MaxPermSize=256m -Xmx1024M -jar cq5-author-4502.jar

• Note:  Command for starting CQ or AEM jar in debug mode :-

  java -Xmx1024m -agentlib:jdwp=transport=dt_socket,address=8000,server=y,suspend=n -jar cq-author-4502.jar

• 
• CQ will start the server on browser window. The default credentials for logging into the instance are:
  User Name: admin
  Password: admin
  URL: For author instance http://localhost:4502 and for publish instance http://localhost:4503.
  

List of different CQ Admin Console available after installation:-

Site Admin Console:-

Url for opening site Admin console: http://localhost:4502/siteadmin

CRX

Url for opening CRX console: http://localhost:4502/crx/explorer/index.jsp

OSGI Management Console

OSGI console is used for starting,stopping and deploying bundles.
Url for opening OSGI Management console: http://localhost:4502/system/console

CRXDE Lite

Crxde Lite is the IDE of CQ, component,template site every thing is developed in this zone.
Url for opening crxdeLite console: http://localhost:4502/crx/de

Package Manager

It is basically a part of crxde lite, whre we can install, build and deploy packages.
Url for opening Package Manager console: http://localhost:4502/crx/packmgr/index.jsp

We can also navigate to Package Manager from the homepage of CQ5.