1. Import the GPG KEY from the elasticsearch repo.

 curl -s http://packages.elasticsearch.org/GPG-KEY-elasticsearch | sudo apt-key add –

2. Add the repo.

echo "deb http://packages.elasticsearch.org/elasticsearch/1.3/debian stable main" |sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/packages_elasticsearch_org_elasticsearch_1_3_debian.list

3. Update your apt cache.

sudo apt-get update

4. Install the elastic search package.

sudo apt-get install elasticsearch

If this is a server, then configure ES to run on system start and start ES now:

sudo update-rc.d elasticsearch defaults 95 10
sudo service elasticsearch

If this is a development environment, then the following may help.

Homebrew on MacOSX allows for ability to simply run “elasticsearch –config=myconfig.yml” and have different elasticsearch instances. I want this on my Linux dev system.

1. Copy elasticsearch shell script to a place in the path. $HOME/bin works just as good as /usr/local/bin here, if it is in your path. Then you can skip the sudo on these commands.

sudo cp /usr/share/elasticsearch/bin/elasticsearch /usr/local/bin/

2. Copy the in.sh file there too.

sudo cp /usr/share/elasticsearch/bin/elasticsearch.in.sh /usr/local/bin/

3. Set the ES_HOME in the in.sh file.

sudo sed -i ‘2 a ES_HOME=/usr/share/elasticsearch’ /usr/local/bin/elasticsearch.in.sh

4. DFSG don’t work if the app isn’t built correctly, so symlink the config back in place. Config won’t get used, but logging.yml will.

sudo ln -s /etc/elasticsearch/ /usr/share/elasticsearch/config

That shall do it. You can now test run a few different instances.

for $dir in a b ; do
mkdir $dir
pushd $dir
cat > config.yml <<EOM
cluster.name: cluster_$dir
path.data: ./data
path.logs: ./log/
network.host: 127.0.0.1
http.port: 1234
EOM
elasticsearch –config=config.yml &
popd
done

Now you have a slightly less terrible elasticsearch on your Linux system, about on par with what you get from homebrew on a Mac.

update:fixed path in sources list creation.
Note: you can substitute 1.4 or 1.5 to get those versions of elasticsearch. Also note, elasticsearch isn’t dependant on a JVM, so you will need to apt-get install openjdk-7-jre-headless or zulu-8. See http://jrwren.wrenfam.com/blog/2015/03/18/zulu-jre-from-azul-systems-is-a-hidden-gem/