At the same time there is also a jMaki release available which supports PHP 5. See Greg's blog for examples on how to use jMaki in your PHP application.

This week we're in the process of updating the online documentation and fixing critical bugs. Download a release, try it out and let us know what you think. Beta release is schedule for next week.

New cool features in jMaki

jMaki is a framework that provides a lightweight model for reusable Ajax-enabled widgets of your own design or for those extending existing toolkits. jMaki allows you to easily add widgets from multiple toolkits on one web page. In addition to supporting toolkits such as Dojo, Yahoo, Google and Scriptaculous, jMaki now supports Mochikit widgets too.

The latest NetBeans plugin supports drag and drop of jMaki components and also a component editor for easy updates to the widgets properties. See the latest screencast high lighting these features.

GlassFish V2 milestone 2 and transparency

GlassFish V2 have lots of great new features such as clustering, administration support for clustering, enable new Web Services stack and many bug fixes. We really want to get feedback on what the community thinks about them so in the spirit of transparency and community building we are putting effort into stablizing milestone 2 before it is released.

Last week the team went into bug fix mode and is fixing high priority bugs. At the same time thousands of tests are being run to find and fix glaring issues. The goal is to provide a release that is stable enough for users to really use it and give valuable feedback.

Start thinking about how you can use GlassFish V2 milestone 2. It will be available in the next week or so.

jMaki's new look

jMaki allows Java developers to use popular AJAX-style widgets as a JSP tag library or JSF component. Recently we updated project jMaki's website with a new look. It's now easier to get started adding widgets to your web apps or creating your own widgets, finding the downloads and getting information on how you can participate.

Also, check out the widget gallery Greg added. The gallery allows you to try out the jMaki widgets and see the source code needed to include the widget in your web applications.

GlassFish V2 Milestone 1 available

Last May we shipped V1_Milestone 7 of GlassFish, a Java EE 5 compatible, production quality application server. We are currently working on the V2 release which adds more enterprise level features. Today we promoted milestone 1 for the V2 release which contains JAXWS 2.0.1, clustering and many bug fixes. Check it out!

To help better communicate our plans for V2 and future releases of GlassFish, we have created a new community wiki. Over time you will find roadmaps, milestone plans, one-pagers (technical descriptions of features). We have added some information there already and more will be added throughout the release. Review the plans, let us know what you think and start contributing.

Choosing the right GlassFish build

As you know M7 is the final, Java EE 5 compatible release for GlassFish v1. It is a production quality, deployable app server. GlassFish v1_UR1 is the follow up bug fix only release to M7. v1_UR1 starts from the same source base as M7 and adds selected bug fixes only. M7 is the current stable release. v1_UR1 has additional, limited bug fixes and those builds are pretty stable.

The next release of GlassFish is v2. The v2 release contains all bugs in v1_UR1, additional bug fixes and additional functionality (JDBCRealm and HTTP compression for example). We are still in the planning stages and will be asking for feedback soon. The v2 builds vary in level of stability but provide the lastest enhancements to the server.

GlassFish BoF summary

The GlassFish BoF on Tuesday evening of JavaOne was well attended with lots of great questions. Jim, Amy and I gave a quick overview of GlassFish, where we are today, highlights on the community and roadmap with future directions. I have posted the slides here .

As I mentioned there were lots of questions during the 50 minute BoF and luckily there were many GlassFish developers, architects and spec leads available to answer all types of questions. I will summarize some of what was covered in case you didn't make it.

Question:Is it really production quality? Answer: yes. Remember GlassFish code was donated in by Sun (SJSAS 8.1) and Oracle (TopLink Essentials). Both products are used in production today. This question was also addresed on the quality alias for GlassFish with more details.

Question:Will clustering features will be added to GlassFish? Answer: Yes. See my previous blog for more information though details have not been worked out. Over the next couple of weeks there will be discussions on what features will be in GlassFish v2 and so the details will be flushed out then.

Question:Are there any books on Java EE 5? Answer: Still a bit early but I know of a few in the pipeline. However, there are many blogs, tech tips, articles which discuss the new features in Java EE 5. The server documentation is available online as well as the Java EE 5 tutorial.

Question:Why did the quality choose TestNG over JUnit for the unified test framwork? Answer: There was a discussion on the quality alias. More notes need to be published but that alias is the right place to get more info.

Question:Why use GlassFish or how do I talk to my management about switching? Answer: GlassFish is the first robust, commercial, compatible Java EE 5 implementation. It is free for development, deployment, and redistribution. You will find GlassFish support in both NetBeans and Eclipse. It has higher throughput, faster response time, and improved management features to streamline deployment, 30 percent faster startup time and web services performance increased by up to 5 times over SJSAS 8.x. There are several support options including $99 for Sun Developer Expert Assistance - See http://developers.sun.com/services/expertassistance/ Many more can be added to the list. We are creating a web page which summarizes the list more completely.

These are some of the questions that were asked that I remember. If I remember more I will update the blog.

GlassFish community awards

At the GlassFish and JUG reception Wed night of JavaOne included some time to recognize contributions from members of the GlassFish community. Several awards have 2 winners because we recognized both Sun employees and non-Sun employees. View GlassFish award

Most bugs filed:
Sanjeeb Sahoo filed 74 issues
Jean-Baptiste Bugeaud filed 40

Most posts to the forum:
Sanjeeb Sahoo had 160 posts
Cay Horstmann had 110 posts

Major Contributions:
Jean-Baptiste Bugeaud (individual) contributed the code for JDBCRealm which is available in GlassFish starting with v2_b01.
Gordon Yorke and Tom Ware (corporate) for their work on the TopLink code which is the Java Persistence API implementation in GlassFish.

Most frameworks and apps tested:
Masoud Kalali tested 7 apps and frameworks for GlassFish v1 release. The full list of applications and frameworks running on GlassFish is here.

Infrustructure support for GlassFish:
Kohuske Kawaguchi has several projects on java.net that support GlassFish but in particular Hudson, a continuous build system is used to determine status of the GlassFish builds. He also created the java.net maven repository and tools to facilitate building GlassFish jars so they can easily be imported into the repository. He also added several of the jars that are now available.

Congratulations to the winners. A big thank you to all who participated in Project GlassFish v1 release.

GlassFish future directions

A TENTATIVE GlassFish roadmap was announced yesterday at JavaOne. Here is a summary of what is planned so far and additional information will be provided soon. Please use the GlassFish dev@glassfish.dev.java.net mailing list to provide feedback.

GlassFish Update Release is the next releaese from the FCS branch and is primarily a bug fix release. This is an opportunity to provide additional bug fixes to the v1 release that were not included in the final release. It should be available in several months.

At the same time, GlassFish v2 is the next "dot" release and currently under development in the trunk of the workspace. There are promoted builds of this release available today however these builds primarily include bug fixes only. The TENATIVE feature list for v2 includes:

• Clustering support - see project shoal
• Load balancing support
• some scripting support - JSR 223
• Performance enhancements
• Tango integration
• Unified Test Framework

v3 release is further out but we are thinking about adding Web 2.0 support, some architecture changes and additional features that are requested by the community. This is very hand wavy at this point but as we discuss v2 we can better understand what features may move into v3 and what new features we would like to consider.

We have more ambitious goals for GlassFish and want to provide a Java EE 5 compatible container that has startup and footprint comparible to other available containers. This could mean significant changes to the code base and a new major release.

As you can see there is alot of work ahead and big plans for the future of GlassFish. More information will be available on the GlassFish site soon. We welcome any and all feedback.

GlassFish Milestone 7 is the final build

Milestone 7 is the final build for GlassFish v1. This is very exciting as it is the first major release of GlassFish. Contributions from the community include patches, documentation updates, ports, blogs and testing. There has been tremendous amount of support considering we announced GlassFish less than one year ago. Thanks to all who helped make this happen.

GlassFish code base is used to create the Sun Java System Application Server PE 9 which is part of the Java EE 5 SDK. SJSAS PE 9 is freely available, deployable, compatible, production quality application server.

GlassFish.next promoted builds

GlassFish.next which cooresponds to SJSAS 9.1 is under development and promoted builds are now available. Many bug fixes have gone into this and new functionality such as a JDBCRealm.

We're finishing up testing on the FCS branch and should have a final release of GlassFish soon. B48 is the latest FCS candidate.

GlassFish build to download

GlassFish is nearing it's first FCS (final and stable) release. At the same time, development continues on the GlassFish.next release. Builds for both releases are available so here is some info to help you figure out which one should you download.

Currently promoted builds from the FCS branch are the only promoted builds avialble and those are announced as they happen. Since these builds are pretty stable and there are very few changes introduced from one build to another, there are no nightly builds from the FCS branch.

Work on the trunk(tip) is for the GlassFish.next release and nightly builds from the trunk are also published. These nightly builds are available, however the naming is a bit confusing. The build number has not been updated on the trunk since the FCS branch was created. To find the appropriate nightly build start with b43 and then look at the date. If today's date is May 4 2006 then the nightly build produced on that day is glassfish-installer-b43-nightly-04_may_2006.jar

Soon we will have a naming convention in place that cooresponds to the next releases of GlassFish. Hope this helps

Latest GlassFish docs

GlassFish Community - Join us at JavaOne

Below, I've listed just a few of the GlassFish related activities at JavaOne. Note the time change for the GlasFish reception.

TS-3274 Project GlassFishSM : Developing the Java™ EE SDK. This session covers the projects around GlassFish, the technical architecture of the open source application server, how users can use and extend GlassFish, demos of ongoing projects and discuss possible future directions.

BOF-0251 - GlassFish - Where we are today and where we are going. Just one year after we open sourced the application server and alot has happened. Amy and I will talk about some of the things that happened over the year. We will discuss the highlevel roadmap for the next couple of releases of GlassFish and present how you can participate in the exciting efforts coming up. This BoF is scheduled for Tuesday eveing 8:30 to 9:25.

GlassFish reception - Note TIME CHANGE. The reception has been rescheduled for Wed May 18th 5pm to 7pm at the Argent Hotel. This is a combined event with the Java by the Bay user group and will include short talks on Java EE 5, AJAX and GlassFish Community introductions and awards with plenty of time to meet other community members.

For a list of GlassFish activities at JavaOne see our wiki page, http://wiki.java.net/bin/view/Projects/GlassFishAtJavaOne. We're still updating the page so check often.

GlassFish BoF and reception at JavaOne

The GlassFish BoF (BOF-0251) is Tuesday evening at 8:30. We'll talk about where we are today, some of the new things we're planning for GlassFish in the coming months and a highlevel roadmap of upcoming releases. Learn how you can participate in GlassFish.next and GlassFish.next.next. Join us in discussing some of the features we're thinking about and give us feedback. Let us know what is working well in the community and also what we can do to improve.

Also just come hang out. Here's an opportunity for members of the GlassFish community to get to know each other and have some fun. During the reception we'll make a few introductions and then recognize some of members who have made contributions to GlassFish. Join us on Wed May 17, 6-8 pm at the Argent Hotel the beer is on us.

GlassFish Java Persistence API download bundle

The implementation of the Java Persistence API has been availale in GlassFish for quite some time. Last week the GlassFish team made available separate Java Persistence API standalone bundle. This is useful for users who want to use Java Persistence but don't want to have to use the EJB container.

Previously out-of-container users had to download GlassFish and extract the required jar files. Now all users need to do is to download the implementation of the Java Persistence API bundle, unzip and they are ready to go. The implementation is feature complete though not yet final so expect weekly builds with bug fixes.

The Tech Tips and Blogs page has pointers to several useful articles and blogs on Java Persistence.

GlassFish distribution license - clarified

I wanted to try and clear up some misunderstandings about exactly what license applies to the binary distributions of GlassFish.

The majority of the GlassFish code is available under the Common Development and Distribution License (CDDL) v1.0 and that applies to source code as well as the binary format. There are components which are open source products under different licenses such as Apache and those components are distributed under their respective license. Finally, there are a few components in GlassFish for which the source is not available and those (and ONLY those) components are covered under Sun's binary license.

Confused? We are doing two things to help clarify things. We have created a wiki which lists each component and the license which covers it. Second, we are working to make the source code available for all components such that Sun's binary license is no longer needed.

Still confused? Ask me below.

GlassFish bug filing contest

There was no winner on the GlassFish bug filing contest. There were alot of bugs filed and many would have been really good candidates but no one submitted a bug id to the contest alias so I could not consider them. That's what the rules said...

Well, this means that I still have an iPod to give away and I do want to give it away. My current thinking is to give it away at JavaOne. We are in the process of planning a GlassFish reception on Wed evening and so will try to think of a give away for that. Stay tuned for details on GlassFish activities at JavaOne.

GlassFish milestone 6 available

GlassFish team is working on it's first final build for the open source project and now has milestone 6 available. At this point, all features in the Java EE 5 specifications have been implemented and only bug fixes will be added to the builds.

Milestone 6 is pretty stable so check it out and let us know what you think.Target date for the final release is May 8.

BP Catalog now hosted live

The app-hosting project allows java.net project owners to show case their applications by deploying them on Sun Java System Application Server PE 8.1 which is hosted by locaweb. BP Catalog 1.0.1 is the latest project that has been deployed and you can try out the solutions that you have been reading about.

BP Catalog project provides a set of guidelines, best practices and sample applications for the J2EE platform. Last week BP Catalog was deployed through the app-hosting project and is now available for users to try out. Some fo the solutions available include an AJAX example for auto-completion, JSF component to create a tabbed views and passing context information for Web Services to handle messages. The complete list of deployed solutions is on the app-hosting page.

Earlier I blogged that project AtLeap was the first application to take advantage of this free service. You can check out their app here. If you are interested in having you application deployed go to the app-hosting project for more info.

GlassFish source bundles now available

Starting this week, source code bundles are now available for GlassFish. Moving forward expect to see binary and source code bundles of the promoted builds. We have also posted the source code bundle for the latest milestone M5 (beta branch) release.

Note that some of the technologies in GlassFish are developed as part of other projects such as JAX-WS. Only a binary of those sources are in the GlasFish workspace. For more information on where to find sources see the following page.

Use GlassFish, give us feedback and win an iPod

We really want your feedback on GlassFish and we're ready to thank you for it. Download GlassFish milestone 5 release. When you find a bug, file it and send an email to the contest@glassfish.dev.java.net alias including the bug id you want to submit to the contest.

Contest runs March 7, 2006 to March 30, 2006. Each bug submitted must be accepted as a valid bug by a GlassFish developer and must not be a duplicate bug to be consideered a valid entry. The winner will be selected based on the priority of the bug and feedback given by submittor. See here for complete rules.

Grand prize is an Apple 20 GB iPod Photo MA079LL/A. Good luck! Sun employees are not eligible to win.

GlassFish Milestone 5 - Beta release

GlassFish Beta or Milestone 5 is offically available. The GlassFish community is building an open source application server implementing the Java EE 5 specifications. Milestone 5 implements the Public Final Draft version of all Java EE 5 specifications except EJB. The latest implementation of that specification will continue to be tracked in weekly builds of GlassFish.

Contributions from Sun, Oracle and individuals in the community have helped to make GlassFish Milestone 5 a great product to try out or learn the new technologies in the Java EE 5 platform. Tools support for GlassFish include a plugin for Eclipse available from the GlassFishPlugins project as well as native support in NetBeans 5.5. There are many blogs and tech tips ranging from how to get started with GlassFish to describing the latest technologies and how to use them. Also check out the frameworks and applications already running on GlassFish.

Sun uses the GlassFish builds to create the Sun Java System Application Sever PE 9.0 which is included as part of the Java EE 5 SDK. Both are available now for download.

GlassFish Plugin for Eclipse updated

GlassFish (Milestone 5) RC available

The Release Candidate, build 32g, for Milestone 5 (beta) of GlassFish is now available. We had to delay the bits because there were issues in the javadocs and when we did the respin we ran into some problems building due to the site outage. Now we think we have the right set of bits all from the beta branch and after some amount of testing seem good.

We think it is ready but let us know if you find major problems as we plan to close the beta branch next week.

GlassFish Tech Tips page and Q&A session

We're trying to make is easier for you to get detailed information about how to use the latest features in GlassFish.

There have been alot of really good blogs, articles and Tech Tips describing how to use the new Java EE 5 features in GlassFish . Many of the blogs have been posted on The Aquarium. There are so many in a week that we created a page in the GlassFish project where we archive what we think users will find interesting and useful. Most of the entries have been written or reviewed by the GlassFish team. If you find something we've missed let us know so we can add it.

Sometimes it's nice to ask a question and as it turns out every month Sun runs an Ask the Expert session where users can submit questions through email and get answers from the developers of a particular technology. There was one on GlassFish a few months back and next week there is a session featuring what is new in JWSDP 2.0. This is a popular program and a great opportunity for you to get the developers' attention. All questions and answers are archived on that same site.

Asking for feedback on GlassFish documentation

GlassFish Milestone 5 (beta release) is due out on Feb 6. We are asking for feedback on the documentation for that release.

The latest revisions of the docs have been posted on the website and we would appreciate any feedback on the Developer's Guide, the Adminstration Guide and new with this release the Application Deployment Guide specifically. Of course, any and all feedback on the document set is welcome. We can incorporate feedback for this milestone until Feb 01 (6pm PST). Feedback received after that date will be address for the final release.

The documentation home page has instructions on how to provide your feedback. Let us know what you think.

Allow users to demo your J2EE app

Project app-hosting has been created for java.net projects to showcase their J2EE application and allow users to demo the app live. LocaWeb, a Brazilian internet service company, has agreed to host the Sun Java System Application Server PE 8.1 and we are very grateful.

The first application available for you to demo is AtLeap, . Hong Zhang, one of the deployment leaders blogged about her experience deploying the AtLeap application on the LocaWeb servers. There are some restrictions and requirements application developer must meet for consideration. For example, this service is for demo purposes and for projects hosted on java.net only. In addition, applications must meet packaging requirments and run on SJSAS PE 8.1. You can find all the requirements on the app-hosting website.

The app-hosting project will keep a list of the applications that are currently deployed. Next app which is in the process of getting deployed is BPCatalog.

javadocs on project GlassFish

Recently I posted the current version of the javadocs in project GlassFish. Included are the javax APIs and the com.sun APIs that have been implemented. Although the title on each pages says J2EE 1.4 SDK, these have been updated to include Java EE 5 APIs. We're working on updating the title and headers over the next few weeks. We also plan to update the site with each promoted build so the javadocs posted will reflect what is in the latest promoted build.

One important note. The specifications for Java EE 5 are NOT final and therefore these javadocs reflect a work in progress. In some cases more information about the API is needed for the docs to be complete. Still, I think you may find these useful.

Which GlassFish build to download

Milestone 5 is the beta release for GlassFish and that started with build 32. Currently build b32b is available for download which has a few more bug fixes than build 32 and is more stable. Milestone 5 is expect out Feb 6.

Also available is build 33. This build is off the main trunk of the workspace and contains the bug fixes found in the milestone 5 builds as will as other bug fixes and enhancements targeted for the final build due out in early May.

The weekly promoted builds of GlassFish have passed a minimum level of testing. which includes the quicklook tests, a sub-set of CTS tests (representative collection of 263 J2EE 1.4 tests) and a sub-set of SQE tests (22 in number). A build is not promoted unless it passes quicklook, CTS smoke and SQE smoke tests.

Eclipse plugin available for GlassFish

Since we announced GlassFish at JavaOne last June people have asked about an Eclipse plugin for GlassFish. Some time ago the GlassFishplugins project was created on java.net just to encourage the creation of different plugins to popular IDEs. Early on we added pointers to the NetBeans plugins for GlassFish and last week the initial version of the Eclipse plugin was added to the project.

I'm excited to announce that you can now download the initial version of the Eclipse plugin and try it out. The plugin requires Eclipse 3.1 and is based on Eclipse WPT and includes a quick start guide. You can download the plugin, ask questions on the forum or mailing lists, or contribute to the next release of the plugin. See project GlassFishplugins for details.

Hibernate and GlassFish

A couple of users have asked how to get Hibernate running with GlassFish. I remembered an article on just that topic written for SJSAS 8.1 although most of the information still applies. Ram describes how to configure Hibernate 2.0 to run on the app server.

I had forwarded pointer to that article to several people who found it useful so I thought I would try to reach a larger audience.

GlassFish technology pages on EJB 3.0 and deployment

Ken Saks from the EJB group in GlassFish has written up some samples for the new EJB 3.0 APIs. There are samples for Stateless, Stateful and Message Driven Beans and all include the source, instructions for deploying and at least one client. Take a look to become more familiar with this technology.

Tim Quinn has published a page describing how deployment works in GlassFish with examples on the different ways users can deploy their application.

GlassFish MileStone 4 available

GlassFish is targeting Feb 6 as the release date for Beta and it's just over a month way. MileStone 4 is the hardcode freeze build which means only approved bug fixes are allowed in the workspace at this time. See the download page to download the server and for the list of bugs fixed in this bundle.

Aside from many bug fixes added, I noticed that this bundle checks that each application deployed defines Java EE 5 deployment descriptors when using annotations and will not allow J2EE 1.4 applications using annotations to be deployed. Downside is deployment time is considerably longer so the next promoted build will allow you to optionally set this feature. Default will be to not test.

With each newly promoted build the server will be more and more stable so I encourage you to try the latest builds of GlassFish. For GlassFish news and highlights checkout the weblog The Aquarium

More examples using GlassFish

More and more I have found blogs about features in GlassFish . Sahoo has written several blogs about Java Persistence. For example, writing a processor to automatically generate your persistence.xml and Introduction to using Java Persistence API in a 3-tier Java EE application Other Java Persistence examples include tech tips on Converting POJOs to a persistent entity.

Pramod posted a blog which talks about the automatic table generation feature in GlassFish.

Also some examples on using Java Persistence outside the application server container.

There are alot of helpful hints on Petr's site on how to use GlassFish features within NetBeans. Creating a custom realm using NetBeans, How to use the entityManager API in a web module and using Java Persistence outside Java EE in NetBeans

Finally, I have created an examples page on the GlassFish site just so users can find useful information about GlassFish.

Interview with GlassFish persistence developers

Last week I had the opportunity to talk with Tom Ware and Gordon Yorke who are working on the persistence module in project GlassFish. Both Tom and Gordon are from Oracle's Ottawa, Canada office and have extensive knowledge of the TopLink codebase. I got a chance to ask them some questions about persistence in GlassFish. Here's what they had to say.

Q. Who is working on EJB 3.0 persistence?

A. As an open source project, anyone can contribute, however the current workload is primarily being done by groups at Oracle and at Sun. People who wish to find out what is going on can simply join the glassfish project and subscribe to the persistence mailing list: persistence@glassfish.dev.java.net

Q. How has Oracle contributed to the EJB 3.0 persistence RI?

A. Oracle has contributed TopLink Essentials to the GlassFish Project. TopLink Essentials is derived from our Oracle TopLink enterprise product. We want to provide a commercial quality RI and by leveraging Oracle TopLink it brings an advanced and proven object persistence implementation to the RI.

Q. What version of TopLink are users getting from the GlassFish project?

A. The GlassFish contribution is based on the most recent 10.1.3 version of Oracle TopLink.

Q. How much of the EJB 3.0 specification has been implemented in GlassFish?

A. The majority of functionality required by EJB 3.0 persistence is implemented. Since we’ve been able to leverage the existing Oracle TopLink product, the majority of the functionality required by EJB 3.0 persistence is already available in the TopLink Essentials RI. At this point in the development nearly all spec-defined features are exposed, with many being quite close to complete. Since the specification is not in its final draft we still expect to add new features as they are finalized. To ensure functional completeness, we have been working closely with the SUN TCK team. Check the persistence web page for updates on the implementation.

Q. Can you give a high level overview of EJB 3.0 persistence?

A. Usage of EJB 3.0 distils down to:
1. You use Java 5.0 annotations and/or xml descriptors to provide the mapping details to map you business objects to your database schema. These mapped objects will now act as a façade to the database.
2. The EntityManager API is used to control the life cycle of the data objects. It controls when objects are persisted, removed and modified in the database.
3. Data can be loaded into instances of mapped entities using the EntityManager’s find method, or through queries defined in the EJBQL query language, and executed through the Query interface.

Q. Are there examples on how to use EJB 3.0 Persistence within Java EE 5?

A. The GlassFish docs are still evolving however, currently there are a few examples that you may find useful to get started. See Sahoo's blog and also there is an example on the persistence website here. We have plans to provide more detailed examples in the coming weeks.

Q. What about persistence outside of an EJB container?

A. One of the big improvements in the EJB 3.0 specification over previous EJB specifications is that now the same business objects can be deployed both in an EJB Container and outside of one. Among other things, this simplifies testing. Tests can be run without ever starting your application server. This makes tasks such as debugging much more simple.

Q. Is the functionality to deploy to SE available now?

A. Yes, this is something we’ve been able to provide in the RI quite quickly since we first published our implementation of this functionality with the TopLink EJB 3.0 preview release last spring and have continually updated it as the specification evolved. Not only is this functionality available now, but we make use of it extensively when we test TopLink features. It is quite convenient.

Q. How do I deploy a Java SE application which uses persistence?

A. The GlassFish persistence website has instuctions on how to do this now. There is some work involved but for the adverturous developer it's not too bad. See the following example .

Q. How has the exercise of implementing this allowed you to provide feedback to the spec and improve it?

A. Throughout the spec process we have been lucky to have a close working relationship with Mike Keith the Specification co-lead. All along we have been able to provide Mike with feedback on the practicality of some of the spec proposals based on our experience working with users of ORM tools. As well we find that as we implement things, we are in a position to provide feedback about where the specification needs more detail.

Q. How will this specification benefit users?

A. I think the standardization of API's and functionality will help clear the confusion surrounding persistence in general. Users will now have a standard way of implementing their applications to leverage the power and convenience that a persistence provider provides.

Thanks Tom and Gordon for your time. I look forward to seeing more detailed articles descibing design features in the persistence module and also how to use this functionality both within the Java EE and the Java SE platforms.

More tech tips for GlassFish

See Greg's tech tip on using Java technology for the server-side processing of AJAX interactions. He provides sample code for an autocomplete application and shows how to run on GlassFish.

Before Abhijit left as project lead, he and Sriramulu published a tech tip on Converting a POJO to a Persistent Entity. The example shows you how to convert a POJO (Plain Old Java Object) to a persistent entity, and how to use that entity from a Java Servlet. They also provide instructions for running on GlassFish along with alot of sample code in the tech tip itself.

New project lead for GlassFish

During much of his career here at Sun, I've had the pleasure of working with Jerome on several projects. He is a Sun veteran with more than 9 years in Java Software. Jerome started in 1996 to work on the JavaBeans team then moved on to create the Java Plug-in. After a few more years in Java SE, he moved to Java EE land, where he helped with the verifier for J2EE 1.3. He then architectured the AVK before moving into deployment area and finally web services for J2EE 1.4. During Java EE 5 development, he participated in the Ease of Development designs and continued leading the web services implementation in Glassfish while lobbying for the Mac OS X support.

You may have seen his posts on the forums and the GlassFish aliases or seen him speak at several JavaOne conferences or read one of his blogs. I'm excited to be working closely with Jerome again.

Thanks to Abhijit Kumar for his work as project lead while getting GlassFish over to open source and good luck in the field of technical managment.

Review drafts of GlassFish documentation

The GlassFish documentation set has many books to help users understand how to use and manage the server. Many of those documents are now on the GlassFish project in draft form. The Developer's Guide, Application Deployment Guide and the Troubleshooting Guide are just a few. See the documentation page for the full list of documents now available and how to participate.

The docs are in an unfinished state and in some cases have missing sections however, because they are based on the previous version of the application server there is quite alot of content.

All feedback is welcome and specifically we'd love to get simple examples to add to the docs.

GlassFish support in NetBeans

Netbeans support for Java EE 5 features is under way and it's easier to run on GlassFish. Builds of the Netbeans.next release are available now and contain annotation support, persistence support, Derby database integration, GlassFish resource creation and registration as well as all NetBeans 5.0 features.

To help you get started there are a couple of tutorials. One is a simple hello world application and the other a more advanced enterprise application using Java EE 5 persistence. See the GlassFish and Netbeans Integration page for more details

Results of GlassFish button survey

GlassFish "Ask the Experts" session

Vote for GlassFish button.

EJB 3.0 Persistence in GlassFish

In the last week or so alot of code has been added to the GlassFish project to support the persistence module . This code includes CMP 2.1 and EJB 3.0 persistence. The EJB 3.0 Persistence code is based on TopLink and contributed by Oracle.

Check out the email alias persistence@glassfish.dev.java.net for technical discussions including Sun and Oracle engineers. Download the latest promoted build and start playing around with it.

GlassFish Web Services management group online

GlassFish includes JAX-WS 2.0 in each of it's nightly and promoted builds. In addition to including the standard implementation, GlassFish includes features to help manage the web services once they are deployed on the server.

In Glassfish, all web service endpoints are discovered and shown distinctly, so they can be managed. Response times and invocation counts are tracked and this performance information can be graphed in real time. See the Web Services Management page for more information on what can be done, how it is done and what still needs to be done.

Java EE Management Spec implementation in GlassFish

Another group in the Admin and Monitoring module of GlassFish is online. This group has implemented the J2EEManagedObject base model, optional StateManageable model for the server management object, and MEJB. The objects that can be managed include J2EEDomain, J2EEServer, Applications, Modules, Resources, JVM and other manageable objects within the server. The monitoring has been implemented so that it can be extended in the future to cater to the statistics provider model.

The owner is Sreenivas Munnangi, aka Sreeni, who is on the dev@glassfish.dev.java.net list. Checkout JSR 77 implmentation to get details of the implementation and also look at the "ToDo" section to see how you can get involved!

GlassFish nightly builds available

We have had many requests for GlassFish on MacOS as well as access to the nightly builds. Both are now available.

Promoted builds have been available for GlassFish since June 2005. Now you can download the nightly builds too. Promoted builds differ from the nightly builds in that they must pass a minimum level of testing. which includes the quicklook tests, a sub-set of CTS tests (representative collection of 263 J2EE 1.4 tests) and a sub-set of SQE tests (22 in number) to be promoted.

Thanks for the feedback. Please keep it comming.

Callflow module in project GlassFish goes online

When project GlassFish was introduced in early summer, the webtier group had web pages up helping users learn about the technologies in the webtier and how to find their way through the code. Today another group, callflow , is online too.

The new feature, callflow, is turned on and off through the admin interface. Once turned on, runtime information such as which containers were entered, the length of time spent in each container, transaction id, user principal, method name and exceptions is collected and stored in a database. Using the admin gui, developers and system administrators can examine the lists of requests that hit the server and also drill down on a request to get more details.

GlassFish is Sun's Open Source J2EE application server.

Easier to access GlassFish

Many people have said that getting to the details of the GlassFish project was confusing or unintuitive. The error messages left users not knowing what to do next. Well, we listened to the feedback and we got rid of the click-through requirmement to accept the CDDL license before viewing the code or some of the project pages.

All project pages and code are accessible when you visit the site and this includes the weekly download builds too. Please keep sending us feedback!

Carla

Getting started with GlassFish

In order to help people get a jump start on using the lastest web features in GlassFish, I posted a web archive and instructions for deploying and running the examples. The web archive contains simple examples that use the latest features in the Servlet 2.4 specification which is part of Java EE 5.

Use these examples as a starting point to learn about the new features in Java EE 5 and creating you own web applications. I'm working on uploading examples using the latest JSP features too.

GlassFish external commitor

GlassFish has it's first external commitor, Jacob Hookom! Wait, how is that possible? It's only been a couple of weeks. Well, although GlassFish has been available on java.net for only a few weeks, Jacob has worked with the JSF and webtier teams for over a year where he as contributed ideas and code to both projects.

Jacob originally got involved with the JSF-RI when he wrote a JSF specific EL implementation. While working and contributing to the JSF-RI, he was able to offer other ideas which lead him to join the JSF 1.2 EG. Once things were fleshed out for the alignment of JSP 2.1 and JSF 1.2; he was included on web tier discussions where he introduced the concept of deferred variable resolution for JSTL and JSF integration. He also turned the JSF EL implementation into a reference implementation for the EL-API that's able to optimally handle the unique requirements of a JSF application's lifecycle.

Here's a quote from him: "The employees from Sun are always accessible and extremely receptive to new ideas; not only within the Java.net projects, but also as specification leaders in the JCP."

In addition, Jacob has his own project on java.net called Facelets which is a sub-project of the JSF-RI.

We are very excited to have Jacob on the team and we would love to have others participate in GlassFish too. There are several ways to participate and we encourage you to do so. Join in on the technical discussions on the dev@glassfish.dev.java.net alias and GlassFish forum, submit a bug, request a feature or provide a patch for a new feature or bug fix.

Announcing GlassFish

The GlassFish Project is a gathering place for developers who wish to participate in the community development of the latest version of the Java™ 2, Enterprise Edition (J2EE™) SDK. Developers can participate in the development process where community members can review source code, submit improvements, and join in technical discussions. GlassFish is a renewed partnership between Sun and the larger enterprise Java community.

Community development means that you work under the Java Research License (JRL) with the important understanding of ensuring compatibility of J2EE. It is the response to our developers who want access to the source code, the ability to contribute to the development of GlassFish, the server which is first with specifications, and enable them to understand Sun's J2EE development process while maintaining compatibility of J2EE. We only ask that you accept the JRL before checking out the project details.

I'm happy to announce that GlassFish is available for all developers to checkout, learn from and contribute to. I've worked on Sun's J2EE SDK for the past 6 years in some form or another. The people I've worked with on GlassFish are very smart, responsive and nice to work with. A multitude of us have given various talks at JavaOne and other conferences. Now you have the ability to work with us more closely than ever before. And we have the ability to get to work more closely with the numerous J2EE developers, many of whom are working on great implementations/additions to the technologies. It's a great way for all of us to build even better technologies.

At this time you have access to all the J2EE 5.0 based server code. Currently the webtier module is online with web pages and mailing lists to help understand that module and provide a mechanism to learn about what is available. We are working on creating the pages for the other modules. The webtier module includes code for a new HTTP connector, Grizzly, written entirely in Java and uses Java's NIO technology. For an overview on how it works see the webtier page of GlassFish.

You can also download the weekly promoted builds, install the server and checkout Grizzly and other new features that way.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License.