JAX-RPC 2.0 EA on JWSDP 1.5 - Install instructions

JAX-RPC 2.0 EA was released few days ago and was supported only on Sun Java System App Server 8.1 container. This blog tells you how to install JAX-RPC 2.0 EA over JWSDP 1.5. The main advantage of being able to install over an existing JWSDP 1.5 installation is that you can alternatively use Tomcat as your container, in addition to Sun's Application Server. Theoretically, you should get support for Sun Java System Web Server as well, but I've not verified that yet.

Lets say JAX-RPC 2.0 EA bundle is installed in JAXRPC_HOME directory, JWSDP 1.5 is installed in JWSDP_HOME directory, and Tomcat is installed in TOMCAT_HOME directory.

Here are the steps involved to install JAX-RPC 2.0 on JWSDP 1.5:

1. Download this script in JAXRPC_HOME.
2. Go to JAXRPC_HOME directory and invoke

   JWSDP_HOME/apache-ant/bin/ant -f istackonjwsdp.xml install

That is all it takes to install JAX-RPC 2.0 EA over JWSDP 1.5.

Now you need to (re)install JWSDP 1.5 over Tomcat container. Go to JWSDP_HOME/jwsdp-shared/bin directory and invoke the following command:

3. jwsdpontomcat.[bat or sh extension depending upon your platform] TOMCAT_HOME

This installs the JAX-RPC 2.0 binaries from JWSDP 1.5 onto your Tomcat installation.

Now that the Tomcat container is all ready to roar with JAX-RPC 2.0 binaries, there is a slight tweak required to run the samples bundled along with JAX-RPC 2.0 EA distribution. You need to change the deploy target in JAXRPC_HOME/samples/etc/common-targets.xml so that the created WAR file is now deployed to the Tomcat container instead of the Application Server. Just change the target to:

<target name="deploy">
	<!-- copy file="${build.war.home}/jaxrpc-${ant.project.name}.war"
           todir="${as.home}/domains/${domain}/autodeploy"/ -->
        <property environment="env"/>
	<copy file="${build.war.home}/jaxrpc-${ant.project.name}.war"
           todir="${env.CATALINA_HOME}/webapps"/>
</target>

To develop, deploy and invoke the samples, you need to use the Ant that is installed in TOMCAT_HOME as part of JWSDP installation.

Start the Tomcat container by invoking TOMCAT_HOME/bin/startup.[sh or bat] , and follow the rest of instructions from the samples documentation. All your samples can now be deployed on Tomcat container, in addition to Sun's Application Server.

In order to run them on Application Server again, you need to revert the change made above in the deploy target. Hope you find this useful.