该wiki上有这样几句话来介绍solr multicore:
In solr, the "multi core" concept refers to the ability to have multiple cores running in the same webapp.
Multiple cores let you have a single Solr instance with separate configurations and indexes, with their own config and schema for very different applications, but still have the convenience of unified
administration. Individual indexes are still fairly isolated, but you can manage them as a single application, create new indexes on the fly by spinning up new SolrCores, and even make one SolrCore replace another SolrCore without ever restarting your Servlet
Container.
Optionally as of Solr4.4 and mandatory for Solr5.0,
the structure of the solr.xml file has changed. In a nutshell, <cores> and <core> have been replaced by auto-discovering cores. Whether to use old or new-style core definitions is determined by whether the <cores> tag is present in solr.xml. In 5.0, presence
of the <cores> tag will generate an error on startup.
An optional property coreRootDirectory can cause the discovery process to start at an arbitrary directory other than SOLR_HOME.
We'll distribute a new-style solr.xml as the default in the example directory with Solr4.4
The sharedLib attribute on the top-level <solr> element is replaced by a child str element (see below). In theory, the old mechanism should continue to support sharedLib,
but SOLR-4791 documents the fact that it doesn't work in 4.3.0.
Exploration of the core tree terminates when a file named core.properties is encountered. Discovery of a file of that name is assumed to define the root of a core. There is no a-priori limit
on the depth of the tree. That is, the directories under the core root are explored until a core.properties file is encountered, and that directory is assumed to be the instanceDir for that core. Subdirectories of any directory that has a core.properties file
are NOT examined for additional cores.
从上面的介绍中可以看到,探测将从core root开始(core root可以在solr.xml文件中以coreRootDirectory属性定义),不限制深度地递归遍历其所有子目录,直到一个名为core.properties的配置文件被发现。含有该core.properties文件的目录将被当作一个core的instanceDir目录,并且该目录下的子目录即使再含有core.properties文件也不会被当作另外core的instanceDir。
那么core.properties文件都可配置哪些信息呢?如下所示:
name - the name of the core. If not specified, the name comes from the containing directory.
config - the configuration file. Defaults to solrconfig.xml
dataDir - the directory where the index, tlog, etc. are stored. Again, since this is discovery-based, omit this unless you have special needs.
ulogDir - where the transaction log resides. It may be advantageous to put the transaction lot on a different disk than the index.
schema - the schema file. Defaults to schema.xml
shard - the shard ID.
collection - the collection to which this core belongs
roles - SolrCloud role definition
properties - properties file to override core definitions. TBD: This is probably obsolete since we're reading a properties file in the first place. Is there a use case for supporting this now?
loadOnStartup - [true|false] this core should be loaded and a searcher opened when Solr starts.
transient - [true|false] this core may be unloaded if the core cache exceeds transientCacheSize (defined in solr.propreties)