The Aquarium

2012 @ full speed

alexismp — Mon, 2 Jan 2012 01:00:00 +0000

First of all, on behalf of the GlassFish team here at Oracle, wishing you all readers the very best for 2012!

Phew, 2011 is done and it's time to look at the year to come and what we should all expect to achieve together.

First, and probably above all, Java EE 7 is what will keep most of the team busy for 2012. While there's the obvious Cloud/PaaS theme, there will also be a lot in store developers with JMS 2.0, javax.cache, JAX-RS 2.0, JPA 2.1, but also CDI 1.1, Batch, Identity, State Management, JSON, Concurrency for JavaEE, and more.

Of course there can be no Java EE 7 without a GlassFish 4.0 release, its production-quality Open Source reference implementation. So expect the usual transparent development with regular promoted builds.

But before GlassFish 4.0 hits the streets, you'll be able to enjoy a 3.1.2 release, a highly compatible and improved version of the 3.1.x branch.

Hoping to see you here on TheAquarium as well as in person at one of the conferences around the world !

What else would you like to see in 2012?

2011, a year of delivering on the roadmap

alexismp — Thu, 29 Dec 2011 07:00:00 +0000

After 323 posts here on TheAquarium, 2011 is coming to an end. Let's look back at what we had hoped to achieve and how the GlassFish team (and others) delivered on the promises.

The most anticipated release after the Sun acquisition was probably the delivery of a fully-clustered GlassFish 3.1 in February (see this technical article). Soon after this release, our stats indicated massive uptake, and the follow-up 3.1.1 release aligned with Java 7, another key milestone in the Java world in 2011.

2011 was also the year of Java EE 6 adoption with certifications from WebSphere 8, JBoss 6, Fujitsu Interstage, Apache Geronimo 3, Apache TomEE, and of course WebLogic 12c bringing the list of certified configurations to 12. It was also time to celebrate two years of Java EE 6 and GlassFish and to realize how long a way application servers had come.

Java EE 7-wise, the umbrella JSR was filed (JSR 342), with great progress on JMS 2.0, JAX-RS 2.0, javax.cache, and others, all with transparency. JavaOne was a good opportunity to recap the overall PaaS and platform rationalization direction.

We've stated the cloud and virtualization guiding principles for GlassFish evolution in September. The GlassFish 3.1.2 release is now well on its way and it is very much already possible to start playing with GlassFish 4.0 early bits (for instance to reproduce the JavaOne PaaS Keynote Demo). Finally we've also continued to deliver on portability of applications between GlassFish and WebLogic via even more sharing of components.

Other notable events include the migration of blogs and the project wiki as well as greatly improved Maven support (with Maven Central now hosting way more bits).

On the community side, we had another very successful community gathering and party at JavaOne and were very pleased to welcome an number of new faces in the engineering team. We also enjoyed a number of high-profile users such as espn, parleys, mollom, and more.

One final achievement that came in late in the year is the support of WebSocket in Grizzly. You can browse through a number of additional posts all tagged with frontpage.

Can we all do better in 2012? You bet!

You'll find other Java-related 2011 blogs on java.net as well as on the Java blog.

Sister blog - GlassFish for Business

alexismp — Tue, 20 Dec 2011 03:46:54 +0000

While this Aquarium blog is a one-stop-shop for anything GlassFish and Java EE from Oracle and from the community, we also maintain a GlassFish for Business blog for those of you interested in making the most of your GlassFish commercial license.

The most recent post there, "Difference between GlassFish Open Source and Commercial Editions", covers just that - why even acquire an Oracle GlassFish Server license? Is is just the support or is there anything more? (hint: there's more).

Another recent post covers the release of Oracle GlassFish Server 3.1.1 Patch 2, a great example of the value for GlassFish customers - a regular cadence of patch releases.

For those interested in finding out more :
• Tech Price List (grep for "GlassFish")
• Commercial GlassFish Offerings from Oracle (how fixes are applied to commercial an open source bits)
• Oracle GlassFish Server and GlassFish Server Open Source Edition (Free vs. commercial, a blog from last year). Being consistent is a good thing (tm).

Sister blog - GlassFish for Business

alexismp — Tue, 20 Dec 2011 03:46:54 +0000

Another recent post covers the release of Oracle GlassFish Server 3.1.1 Patch 2, a great example of the value for GlassFish customers - a regular cadence of patch releases.

Checking in on GlassFish 3.1.2

alexismp — Fri, 9 Dec 2011 01:22:00 +0000

Sathyan has recently sent an email about the recent progress made for GlassFish 3.1.2. You can read some background information about this specific release in this earlier post.

To give you a sense of where the team stands on this release, consider the following :
• First Release Candidate due out in mid-January
• Code Freeze scheduled for Dec 12th
• We're now at lucky promoted build #13
• 200+ bugs already fixed

While it gets harder to get new bugs fixed every day as we approach the stabilization phase, it's not too late to provide feedback in the form of bug votes or general comments on the current promoted builds. And remember - it's never a bad idea or a bad time to submit a bug or an RFE.

GlassFish 3.1.2 themes and features

alexismp — Mon, 7 Nov 2011 00:23:00 +0000

The list of features planned for GlassFish 3.1.2 is shaping up nicely as reflected on the Wiki. This includes three types of improvements: new features, updated components and bugs fixes.

My favorite new features include DCOM node support (alternative to SSH on windows), and GMS non-multicast support. The list of updated components is also a top choice but seeing the issues you reported or the ones you care most about should be on top of your list, so make sure you vote and make it happen.

To some people who like entirely new shiny products, this may sound like a boring release. To others the "dot-dot" releases are the exciting ones given the level of stability that they reach which usually means safer large-scale deployments. Finally, remember, these are plans for GlassFish Open Source Edition and things can change (if they do, we'll keep you posted, as always).

It ain't your dad's J2EE application server

alexismp — Mon, 24 Oct 2011 01:00:00 +0000

With the fairly large number of Java EE 6-compliant implementations, both for the full platform and the web profile, Antonio Goncalves put out a new post comparing startup time and memory footprint of different products.

Of all the Java EE servers, GlassFish comes out second to Resin, by a small margin, on startup time (less than two seconds), and second to TomEE on memory footprint. This shows that the innovative architecture GlassFish pioneered is still paying off as others are coming to market with similar goals and architectures.

As Antonio clearly states, this is not a benchmark but rather a way to realize how much lighter-weight almost all servers have become. Coupled with the radical simplification of Java EE 6, that's two major arguments to look into the standard Java EE platform to cover all your enterprise Java needs, that is if you're not using it already.

Last Call: GlassFish Community Event & Party

alexismp — Tue, 27 Sep 2011 09:00:03 +0000

Quick note that we're having our GlassFish Community Event this coming Sunday (October 2nd) at the Moscone Center in San Francisco.

We're accepting a few more RSVP's on the wiki (if you had issues editing the page before, all should now be smooth).

The other event that same day is of course the GlassFish Party at the Thirsty Bear. Registrations are on the same wiki page. See you there!

Last Call: GlassFish Community Event & Party

alexismp — Tue, 27 Sep 2011 09:00:03 +0000

Quick note that we're having our GlassFish Community Event this coming Sunday (October 2nd) at the Moscone Center in San Francisco.

We're accepting a few more RSVP's on the wiki (if you had issues editing the page before, all should now be smooth).

The other event that same day is of course the GlassFish Party at the Thirsty Bear. Registrations are on the same wiki page. See you there!

New GlassFish Face - Romain

alexismp — Tue, 27 Sep 2011 02:00:01 +0000

Romain Grecourt is our most recent addition to the GlassFish development team. He's based in the Prague development center and will focus on samples, build and installer.

His first claim to fame is the recent set of improvements to support Maven 3.x and JDK 7 for building GlassFish.

If you're following very carefully GlassFish development, you may recognize his name as one of the developers contributing as part of the Serli team to the application versioning feature in GlassFish 3.1.

Welcome to GlassFish Romain!

GlassFish 4.0, starting the engines

alexismp — Fri, 23 Sep 2011 02:54:14 +0000

We've previously described the road to GlassFish 4.0 (and Java EE 7) and Shreedhar has now just informed the DEV alias that we've reached GlassFish 4.0 promoted build #2 en route to a first Milestone build.

If you're eager to start playing with the (admittedly somewhat bleeding edge) bits, go to the promoted builds page, grab your favorite artifact (or build from source) and provide feedback.

See you with more details at JavaOne!

GlassFish.next: more PaaS, more community focus

alexismp — Wed, 7 Sep 2011 02:15:03 +0000

It's been more than 18 months since Oracle acquired Sun and almost as much since we put out the original GlassFish Roadmap sharing how strategic the GlassFish community and product are to Oracle. We've since executed on everything promised back then :

• GlassFish 3.0.1, the first Oracle release
• GlassFish 3.1 with full and enhanced clustering and more
• GlassFish 3.1.1, a bug-fix release with component and platform updates (including Java SE 7)
• Started JCP expert groups : JMS 2.0, JSF 2.2, JAX-RS 2.0, EL 3.0, Servlet 3.1 and of course Java EE 7 itself, all transparently

Granted we didn't stick to the initial date for 3.1.1 and had to delay the release to address a number of customer and community concerns, which we think was the right thing to do (tm). As a consequence, with Java EE 7 on a tight schedule and GlassFish 4 set to be the associated reference implementation, we've decided to integrate the Cloud-enabling and PaaS features directly into this upcoming Java EE 7 release.

In the interim, we're looking at delivering a 3.1.2 release in the same spirit as 3.1.1, insisting on quality and stability while integrating updated versions of its various components (Jersey, Grizzly, Metro, Weld, Mojarra, etc.). Note also that more sharing of components between GlassFish and WebLogic is still very much a key goal as well as improved integration with the rest of the Fusion Middleware offering (Oracle Coherence, Oracle Access Manager, and more).

GlassFish.next: more PaaS, more community focus

alexismp — Wed, 7 Sep 2011 02:15:03 +0000

More new faces at GlassFish DEV!

alexismp — Fri, 2 Sep 2011 02:00:01 +0000

It's been exactly a year since we've announced new developers joining the GlassFish development team and high time for another batch.

From left to right, Miroslav Kos (aka Miran), Iaroslav Savytskyi (aka Iarda) and Lukas Jungmann (aka Jungi) have all joined the GlassFish Web Services team in Prague. Join the rest of the team in welcoming all three of them.

More resources for GlassFish can only be good news! Expect more in the near future.

GlassFish powers Parleys.com

alexismp — Thu, 1 Sep 2011 02:00:00 +0000

The popular Parleys.com eLearning platform is now powered by a GlassFish cluster.

Stephan Janssen was kind enough to share the reasons for moving from Tomcat to GlassFish in this new GlassFish Story (make sure you read the detailed questionnaire linked from there for some technical details).

Parleys.com features an enormous amount of quality content offered in a modern and effective user interface. If you don't know where to start, go for the Java Space, GlassFish content or the Devoxx 2010 space.

GlassFish powers Parleys.com

alexismp — Thu, 1 Sep 2011 02:00:00 +0000

The popular Parleys.com eLearning platform is now powered by a GlassFish cluster.

GlassFish 3.1.1 has been released! Java 7 inside.

alexismp — Thu, 28 Jul 2011 09:00:00 +0000

Got Java 7? GlassFish 3.1.1 does and it's now available!

This is a highly-compatible release which everyone using GlassFish 3.0, 3.0.1 or 3.1 should really consider. Its content were for the most part driven by community and customer requirements. Some had to do with critical bug fixes (we have hundreds of fixes in this release), others with upgrading the versions of the product components such as Weld, EclipseLink, Jersey, etc. with performance also a focus to keep GlassFish in the top performing spot.

Another important driver for this release was support for additional platforms : AIX, 64-bit load-balancer, and maybe most importantly support for Java 7 (shipping today as well). This means that you can now benefit from the JVM improvements that come with this new shiny version but also use the new language constructs defined in project coin. Check out this screencast for an example of what can be done.

You can also listen to this new episode of the GlassFish Podcast which features a discussion with Sathyan, the Engineering manager for this release. Finally, you can get more details in the release notes and the documentation set.

If you are an existing GlassFish 3.x user, the update center will offer you a binary upgrade, similar to what happened when 3.1 was released in February.

In addition to the Open Source bits, GlassFish 3.1.1 is available via Oracle GlassFish Server, the Oracle-branded and supported offering, as well as in the Java EE 6 SDK Update 3 (including a bundle with JDK 7).

Yet another Java EE 6 book

alexismp — Tue, 21 Jun 2011 00:01:03 +0000

We have a new Java EE 6 book in store! This one from Packt Publishing is called "Java EE 6 Development with NetBeans 7" by David Heffelfinger who is also author of Java EE 5 and GlassFish books.

This book holds a step-by-step book documention all of the Java EE 6 features and APIs (including CDI) using the IDE with the best Java EE out-of-the-box experience : NetBeans 7. It uses GlassFish as the default container and PrimeFaces as a JSF component suite.

We've covered several Java EE and GlassFish books before and I can't help but think that given writing books never helped authors retire early, having so many good books on Java EE 6 says something about its success among developers.

Yet another Java EE 6 book

alexismp — Tue, 21 Jun 2011 00:01:03 +0000

We have a new Java EE 6 book in store! This one from Packt Publishing is called "Java EE 6 Development with NetBeans 7" by David Heffelfinger who is also author of Java EE 5 and GlassFish books.

GlassFish 3.1 Adoption - 750k auto-updated and counting!

alexismp — Wed, 18 May 2011 00:00:01 +0000

Yes, that's 750,000 (obviously active) instances of GlassFish 3.0.x that were updated to GlassFish 3.1 since the product was released. Anil Gaur, VP of Engineering for GlassFish has a blog entry on this great number.

So as you can see, other than being really convenient for users to update parts or all of their GlassFish installations, the Update Center gives us a great pulse of how the community of users is doing. Also remember that you can run your own in-house repositories and also contribute to the public ones.

What makes this number of in-place upgrades even more interesting is the relatively low number of problems reported against 3.1 (most issues reported are for people coming over from 2.x).

Welcome to the New Aquarium!

alexismp — Fri, 6 May 2011 20:54:00 +0000

We're back! Now that we've migrated to blogs.oracle.com we have a new shiny look and don't intend to change the content from what you have been used to. Check out the few entries posted while we were not publicly visible.

Other companion blogs such as the GlassFish Stories, The GlassFish Podcast or GlassFish for Business have also been migrated.

As for individual blogs, you should not only be able to continue reading content from the GlassFish engineers but we've spent time making sure that the valuable content from now retired bloggers is still accessible.

Let us know if anything doesn't work for you, chances are we haven't caught everything in the migration process. Thanks!

And now for some serious blogging to catch up with what happened during the migration period.

Clustering in GlassFish 3.1 - a fundamental article

alexismp — Mon, 14 Mar 2011 00:01:00 +0000

With clustering being such an important new feature in GlassFish 3.1, it's important to get the vocabulary right and to understand the key concepts and features in the product. This is exactly what this detailed article written by the key engineers behind the implementation is set to do.

Tom, Bobby, Joe and Mahesh discuss basic clustering concepts, define what DAS, nodes, GMS, and HA are in the context of GlassFish and offer a description of the admin server and of the overall cluster architectures. The article also discusses the key role played by ssh and what it takes to install and administer such an architecture.

This is probably a good time and place to remind you that GlassFish 3.1 comes with full documentation: 20+ guides from quick-start to tuning.

Clustering in GlassFish 3.1 - a fundamental article

alexismp — Mon, 14 Mar 2011 00:01:00 +0000

This is probably a good time and place to remind you that GlassFish 3.1 comes with full documentation: 20+ guides from quick-start to tuning.

Leftik and Gaur on OTN about GlassFish Server 3.1 and interop with WebLogic Server

alexismp — Mon, 7 Mar 2011 12:00:00 +0000

If you've missed last week's release of GlassFish 3.1, you can tune in to this 20-minute video from OTN with Justin Kestelyn discussing with Anil Gaur (VP Development for GlassFish) and Adam Leftik (GlassFish Product Manager ) the release as well as the interoperability efforts with Oracle WebLogic Server.

The discussion covers positioning GlassFish vs. WebLogic with the sharing of components (EclipseLink, Metro, Mojarra, Jersey, JAXB, etc.) and going forward, a common micro-kernel. On the GlassFish front, Adam does a rundown of what's new in 3.1 and touches on the Oracle Coherence integration as well as Integration with other Oracle products. The differences between the open source and Oracle-branded products is also discussed in this interview.

JavaEE 7 is also covered in the dicsussion with the caveat that the platform JSR and four other JSRs have been filed since the recording.

GlassFish 3.1 is here!

alexismp — Mon, 28 Feb 2011 05:33:03 +0000

Oracle has released GlassFish 3.1.

If anyone still thought we were going for a Children's Edition, let me reassure you - GlassFish Server Open Source Edition 3.1 now offers full clustering, centralized admin and many more production features while preserving the developer friendliness with its modular design.

Update: check out coverage of day #2 in this other blog post.

We are also releasing Oracle GlassFish Server 3.1 the supported product which has GlassFish Server Control already integrated for easier evaluation (the add-ons, more on that in a later post). The differences between the OSS bits and this product are highlighted on glassfish.java.net and just to be clear, clustering and centralized admin are part of the open source bits.

The Java EE SDK is also getting a facelift with a new Update 2 release. Expect a number of blogs from the engineers and the community on many different new features but also some screencasts. I'll be tracking the blogs and articles throughout the day in the later section of this blog entry and highlighting the screencasts in a SOTD (Screencasts Of The Day) series starting later today. You can track the BSC-hosted entries using this URL.

Key Links:
• GlassFish Server Open Source Edition 3.1 - downloads, docs
• Oracle GlassFish Server 3.1 - Main page, downloads: full platform, web profile
• "GlassFish 3.1 - What's New" Webinar - (sessions on Monday, February 28, 2011 @ 10:00 am PST / 19.00 CET and Tuesday, March 1, 2011 @ 6:00 am PST / 15.00 CET)

Mollom.com is now GlassFish-powered

alexismp — Thu, 20 Jan 2011 04:04:13 +0000

Drupal creator and leader Dries Buytaert announced last month that Mollom was betting the farm on GlassFish (well, its backend at least). Mollom is a popular web service which helps websites keep spam and other unwanted content such as website spam and profanity off of their web site. I know of a few sites myself that could use some help...

Dries and lodgON's Johan Vos, the architect being the move to GlassFish, were nice enough to share more details on the motivations, challenges and results in this adoption story as well as in this new episode of the GlassFish Podcast (#72). Update: Johan now has a post up on his experience moving to Java EE 6 and GlassFish 3.0.1.

This Java EE 6 application has been running in production for several months now and shows impressive results.
Update : you can now read even more about the specifics of this architecture in this article published on HighScalability.com.
Update 2: mollom.com now has a blog post with the background for this project, the GlassFish choice and some forward-looking statements.

12 GlassFish Webinars!

alexismp — Mon, 10 Jan 2011 12:01:08 +0000

With GlassFish 3.1 soon to be released and Java EE 6 still a very popular topic, the GlassFish Webinar Series announced by Pieter has you covered on lots of different topics.

That's no less than 12 webinars scheduled before the end of May to cover the Java EE programming model, various tools, what's new in GlassFish 3.1, clustering, admin, productivity, Coherence\*Web integration, HK2, Security, Embedded and more.

Here is the registration page for the first event on January 20th:
Web application development with Java EE 6, GlassFish and NetBeans - Free Webinar with Live Q&A.
Update: this page will show the events are registration becomes available.

An update on GlassFish 3.1

alexismp — Thu, 6 Jan 2011 23:52:29 +0000

There might have been some confusion recently around the availability of GlassFish 3.1 in final version (GA/RTM/FCS, pick your favorite acronym). While the original roadmap from March 2010 mentioned late 2010, the JavaOne keynote in September 2010 mentioned two GlassFish releases in 2011. So here is the update :

GlassFish 3.1 Open Source Edition is scheduled to ship in February (exact date still TBD). This is to ensure that we get quality right as we deliver full clustering, centralized admin and much more in this release. The team is working hard on delivering the promised feature as well as a number of add-ons which we hope to cover extensively around the release date.

This release remains one of the most aggressive schedules we've executed on in the history of GlassFish.

As we get closer to the release date of GlassFish 3.1, we'll communicate more and more news on the 3.2 release (currently slated for Q42011). Check this blog and this schedule for updates. And in the meantime get a recent promoted build to try it out for yourself or watch a few videos.

GlassFish in 2011 - What to expect

alexismp — Sun, 2 Jan 2011 18:15:02 +0000

First of all, wishing you all the best for 2011!

Now that 2010 is behind us, it's time to talk about the future. Obviously for GlassFish and Oracle the goal is to deliver on the Roadmap, but I thought I'd boil this down to the following items :

• a final release of GlassFish 3.1, including full clustering.
• more industry Java EE 6 support, including for WebLogic.
• progress on JavaEE 7 and related technologies.
• cloud and virtualization as guiding principles for future versions of GlassFish.
• more alignment between GlassFish and WebLogic effectively offering portability of applications.

What else would you like to see in 2011?

GlassFish in 2010 - What a year!

alexismp — Fri, 31 Dec 2010 01:46:20 +0000

A lot has happened over the past 12 months! For the GlassFish team as for many people that came from Sun, it's been a challenging, yet exciting year.

It all started in January with the EU finally agreeing to the Sun acquisition by Oracle and a first set of changes. Later in March the GlassFish roadmap committed Oracle to the open source project with multiple supported releases in the next few years (with additional heads in the team).

Later that year, the external contributions from the community increased significantly and by June the team had released the "100-day" (Oracle-branded) 3.0.1 release, right in time for the 5-year celebration of GlassFish (with five years of TheAquarium soon after).

While re-stating the commercial strategy for GlassFish, the team worked hard on releasing no less than seven 3.1 milestones, producing and aggregating screencasts. This all lead up to the JavaOne conference with very nice reference customers, clear direction for GlassFish from top-level Oracle management and overal momentum throughout the conference. In Java SE land, "Plan B" was shared with the community.

With Java EE momentum building up, GlassFish was busy with the 3.1 work, adapting to the new java.net infrastructure, and adopting new HTML 5 features. In the meantime OpenJDK, the JCP and others made the news with IBM joining OpenJDK, followed by Apple soon after with JCP elections and JSR votes confirming the proposed roadmap (JavaSE 7 mid-2011).

You can browse through a number of additional posts all tagged with frontpage.