Sun has released the J2EE 1.3 certified Sun One AppServer 7 in production. The platform edition is available for free download and use. Sun One 7 supports JDK 1.4 and the Java Web Services standards that are part of the Java XML Pack. Interestingly, Sun One 7 is built on top of a new re-write of the J2EE reference implementation.

Check out Sun One AppServer 7. Here is the free download link for the Platform Edition.

Building the appserver on top of the RI is a pretty nifty idea. It means the RI is essentially production code, will probably be less buggy, and makes sense from Sun's perspective (one codebase, one team).

However, I'm wondering if Sun might not use this to their advantage in terms of time to market. Since a spec doesn't become official until there is both a spec and an RI for it, what we might end up seeing is new versions of Sun One Appserver releseased very shortly after the final versions of future J2EE specs - long before other appserver vendors have a chance to update their own products.

Floyd

Using the RI as a codebase doesn't necessarily guarantee first mover advantage where new specs are concerned. BEA released WebLogic 6.1, which included J2EE 1.3 features, months before the J2EE 1.3 spec was finalized.

Will they release Linux edition?

Hi,

see the FAQ answer on this at:

http://wwws.sun.com/software/products/appsrvr/faqs_appsrvr.html

Q.

When are the Sun ONE Application Server 7 products available?

A.

Sun ONE Application Server 7 Platform Edition and Standard Edition are generally available now on the Solaris 8 and 9 and Windows 2000 and XP platforms in their English language versions. Availability on Linux will follow first availability by 30 days. Availability on AIX, and HP-UX will be in 90 days of first availability. The Enterprise Edition is planned to be available on the Solaris and Linux platforms by March 2003.

Regards,

Stephen

I remember a year or even longer ago (J2EE 1.2), I read an interview in which a Sun manager encouraged "vendors" to build their AppServers on top of the RI, so they can do this too.
I'm just concerned about "on top of a new RI"... so Sun changed the RI and built their server on top... this is something other vendors cannot... reimplement the RI (or let Sun reimplement it) if they don't like it... then again, Sun seems to pay the implementation cost of the RI.

regards,

Messi

Hi guys.

A question: is commit option A required in J2EE1.3 specs? (I've read the EJB2.0 FR specs, but I didn't any word on the fact that commit option A is optional). Cause if it is, S1AS7 (platform edition) is not J2EE1.3 compatible: quoting from S1AS7 docs: <quote>Note that Commit Option A is not supported at present <quote>

Thanks.

PS: does ACL editing (admin console) feature work for anyone with Mozilla 1.1 (Java(TM) Plug-in: Version 1.4.1_01)? Cause here at my place doesn't. I have to use IE (with the same plugin) in order to edit ACLs.

Bug 4750616:

 ACL editing is not supported on Netscape 6.x and Netscape 7.x browsers. You may face intermittent problems while editing ACL entries using these browsers.
(release notes)

so it will not work with Mozilla..

Hi Horia and all,

Clarification as to the scope of the known HTTP server ACL editing issue on some browsers:

The issue affects editing of HTTP server-oriented ACL files through the Admin GUI. The ACL editing feature found under the "HTTP Server" area of the web-based Admin GUI does not pertain to security constraints contained in J2EE[tm] web applications. As such, the issue does not have much, if any, impact on J2EE application development efforts.

For those users configuring operational environments and requiring the use of HTTP server level ACLs, the workaround is to configure the underlying ACL files directly. See the detailed documentation on the format and use of the HTTP server ACLs files at:

http://docs.sun.com/source/816-7158-10/sgaccess.html#17576

Many serious users of the HTTP server in operational environments make direct edits of the HTTP server ACL files. Some users even script the creation and modification of these underlying ACL files as part of their automated configuration and management systems.

We (Sun) will make a fix for this aspect of the HTTP server administration aspect of the admin GUI soon.

Thanks,
Chris Kampmeier
Sun ONE Software

<quote>
  is commit option A required in J2EE1.3 specs?
</quote>

The way I read the spec [see below], any one of the three commit options (A, B or C) would theoretically suffice for J2EE 1.3 conformance. The reason is that from the bean's perspective they all have the same semantics.

<quote src="J2EE 1.3, ?10.5.9">
  The Entity Bean protocol is designed to give the
  Container the flexibility to select the disposition
  of the instance state at transaction commit time.
  This flexibility allows the Container to optimally
  manage the association of an entity object identity
  with the enterprise bean instances. The Container
  can select from the following commit-time options:
  [A, B, or C].
</quote>

It would be the deployer's responsibility to make sure that the system is configured such that the beans will observe correct container behavior.

Obviously, there are environmental conditions under which commit option "A" is not realiable; but the way it is phrased in the spec would suggest that a J2EE app server is allowed to implement only commit option A (and then explain in accompanying documentation that it only works under certain specific conditions that would allow it to implement the EJB specification correctly.)

However, any reasonable J2EE product must implement either commit option B or C; since these match a very common case where the application server cannot assume that it "owns" the underlying database(s). Also, ECPerf requires use of either option B or C.

I may be wrong here though [someone please correct me if I am], since conformance is effectively defined operationally by having a J2EE app server product pass the J2EE conformance test suite, and I know that we're running everything with commit option B in our test setup. In reality the spec never has the final word in such hair-splitting cases - the test suite has it - so someone would have to dive into the JCK to find out for sure.

Trifork J2EE Team

I donot get it, I went to download the SUN ONE it tells it will be evaluation copy for 60days and some license key needs to be applied..some one pls clarify on the same

The downloaded version will run for 60 days without any additional key. During install, you can enter the key for Standard Edition for Development that is mailed, and the installation will never time out. This would allow you to use the server for as long as you like, for development.
Note: If you downloaded the intergated Sun ONE Studio version, the key would not extend the Studio (you have to buy a license for Sun ONE Studio separtately).

You can also get a key for the free Platform Edition, which would allow you to run the server in production. This, however, will not have the Standard Edition features enabled.

That doesn't sound *free*. This sounds like a marketing ploy.

So let me get this straight. Scott McNealy was going on about how we don't need JBoss any more because Sun is offering its own free appserver.

Except that it's not open source.

And it's not exactly free, either.

And in fact, it's a crippled demo that expires, exactly like I can download from BEA or IBM.

And, Sun is carrying out massive layoffs, which just might affect the quality of support we buy for their proprietary source code.

But hey, at least Sun is starting to look into this 'Web Services' thing that the kids keep talking about.

Does Sun One appserver 7.0 implement JMS 1.1 ?

Folks, let me help clarify this. There are two products that were announced by Sun yesterday. The free version for deployment, Sun ONE Application Server 7, Platform Edition, and the Sun ONE Application Server 7,Standard Edition which sells for money.

The developer license for the Standard Edition is free and Sun encourages you to use this version for development and evaluation, as it allows more features for development, such as remote debugging and multiple application server instances per administration domain (and many more for production).

The Platform Edition is absolutely free of license costs for deployment. You can download it and NO KEY is required for it, so it is not a demo and don't confuse this with evaluation/development versions available for application servers from other vendors.

Only Win and Solaris? No Linux version?

--
[email protected]

Linux/HP-UX/AIX versions will follow in the next 60/90 days.

Some info. see here: http://www.infoworld.com/articles/hn/xml/02/10/28/021028hnsunapp.xml

Regards,
Matt.

Why doesn't mySql appear under list of Database Vendor's?
I thought SUN is support MySQL better.

Because MySQL is not a contender in the enterprise database space (yet). Give it another five years and it *might* have 15% of the functionality in Oracle.

Some of other enterprise database vendors support only 15% of the functionality in Oracle, but claims to be No.1 in DB industry :)

Sergey

Hi Kumar,

The list of officially supported databases in the Sun ONE Application Server Platform Summary document includes only those JDBC drivers that have been used during successful execution of the J2EE 1.3 Compatibility Test Suite (CTS) with Sun ONE Application Server 7.

Additional drivers will be added to the list of supported drivers in the Platform Summary document as Sun successfully executes the CTS with other JDBC drivers in conjunction with Sun ONE Application Server 7.

As you can see in the Sun Software Forums for Sun ONE Application Server 7, users are employing other drivers with the application server. However, these other drivers are not yet represented as officially supported for use with Sun ONE Application Server 7.

http://softwareforum.sun.com/NASApp/jive/forum.jsp?forum=59

Thanks,
Chris Kampmeier
Sun ONE Software

Clarification: Our statement as to the JDBC drivers supported with Sun ONE Application Server 7 includes the backend database products and specific versions that were used in conjunction with successful execution of the J2EE 1.3 Compatibility Test Suite. So it is a driver/database combination that we are stating as officially supported. Not just the driver.

Thanks,
Chris Kampmeier
Sun ONE Software

To Christopher Kampmeier:
Of course I won't judge the S1AS7 based on ACL editing features. I've edited enough httpd.config files so this was not a complain. I am just saying that I expected more care about the "face" of the product.

To Kresten Krab Thorup
Agree, but without commit option A, application level cache is compromised (I am not talking about read-only beans). In my case, I have a 2 millions records account DB, and an account has a 1 to 10 writes to reads ratio, so with commit option B or C, the performance would go away. (of course maybe we can implement a 2 way view of a an account, one to be read-only and other to be read-write, but this will complicate an already complicated bussiness code and in some circumstances won't be even applicable). A common entity bean, pessimisticaly locked, with method-level read-only atributes is more appropriate for our application (JBoss style).

Thanks.

Anyone know how the Platform edition compares performance-wise with Websphere, Oracle 9iAS, Tomcat/JBoss?

Congratulations Sun!!!

Finally Sun released the J2EE server that ROCKS, with nice pricing model! Besides, I found support on Sun forums just wonderful.

Installation process is smooth, administration console is awesome, deployment process is great.

I still miss, however, things like deployment tool, development plugin for JBuilder, and documentation for web services :).

I think, however, that Sun's server is better fit for production use, than for development. I still would use JBoss for EJB development, because JBoss uses reflection to deploy EJBs, instead of generating and compiling RMI stubs/skeletons; therefore deployment of EJBs on JBoss is extremely fast, which is very important during the development process, when you need to redeploy your components very often. Besides, JBoss gives you more detailed error messages during deployment, which enables you to find your errors quicker.

Anyway, I found Sun's products great and am already using it's platform edition. We are planning to buy the standard edition in the future.

I wonder if this pricing model will keep the same for the future releases?