JBoss to Apply for Official J2EE Certification

Jonboy X writes "CNet has an article detailing the resolution of a long-standing feud between open-source J2EE server vendor JBoss and Sun. It seems they've decided to break down and shell out the clams to be certified by Sun. Quoth Bob Bickel, JBoss's vice president of corporate development and strategy: 'Our core base of developers, a lot of them say they don't give a damn...But the reality is that a lot of big companies who are using this are moving into production.' JBoss gives away its server software and survives on support contracts."

Comments

JBoss

[Anonymous Coward]

Can someone please explain to me, concretely, what exactly JBoss is, without using the term "business logic"? I've even used it and don't understand what it is.

Re:JBoss

[eakerin]

I'm of the opinion that you should keep your Data layout logic in stored procs, that way, it's just a matter of updating a few procs if you need to change table layout, and it further sepirates logic from the data model, plus pre-compiled query plans can help out a lot for performance on complex queries.

Of course IAADBA (I am A Database Administrator) so my opinion may be skewed.

Re:JBoss

[Anonymous Coward]

I find it really depends on how you're using the database. Arguably most database applications are heavy on the "read" side, light on the "write" side. Furthermore, most database applications are interested in "localized" data. In other words, they mostly read, and when they write, the effect of the write is limited in scope.

Occasionally, however, the database application needs to perform a lot of writes. If, in addition, the data is highly inter-related, such that writes are not "localized", then the overall picture changes drastically.
For example, let's say your data represents a graph of dependencies, and you need to perform traversal-based calculations that frequently update (write) the data: then your "logic" needs to be embedded in the database (as stored procedures perhaps), rather than in the "middle tier" code, as the "middle tier" is just too slow for such large amounts of data.

In sum: it's fine to embed the application logic in the middle tier "business logic" code, assuming that your "business logic" can perform its decisions based on user input, pre-defined rules, and possibly some small amount of data. HOWEVER, if your "business logic" needs to access a lot of data just in order to perform the decisions, then this "logic" needs to be embedded directly in the database for scalability purposes. At that point, your "middle tier" becomes more of a "data adapter" / "user input processing" layer.

Thoughts?

Re:JBoss

[timjdot]

The questions I've seen are:
1) What does the staff know (db guys do stored procs not Java code)
2) Are there other app.s hitting the data? Maybe then the stored proc.s are a central location for business logic.
3) How fast is the db/ does the app need to be? No matter what db vendors claim, running queries will never be as fast as in-memory objects; even ignoring that the db server is often across a wire. This can be ignored for simple app.s but once the data is over a few thousand records in a few tables and the logic is complex then you really do have to move some data into memory rather than hit the db every time. Consider an algorithm that must touch every row and its relation to another table: better to "cache" the data in memory.
4) Where is the "official data"? Is it in the database? Is it in memory? Both? Is some in one database and some in another? Should the JSP developer's have to contend with knowing this? Etc.
5) Your point that if the algorithm is update intensive then putting it in a stored proc makes more sense.
My experience,
TimJowers

If you don't understand what this is worth..

[immanis]

If you don't understand what this is worth, you really haven't had to try and fight with people in the company who have the power to say "No, we will not use JBoss in production."

People are pushing hard for JBoss. The answer, from the people who have the power to say no, has always been "It's not proven."

Those people NEED things like official certifications to believe in products. They need it more than a list of who is using it where. And they will pay millions of dollars for a product that gives them these assurances..

Re:If you don't understand what this is worth..

[Anonymous Coward]

It's sad really - comes down to abdication of responsibility. The "IT Operations Management" people are completely unwilling to take on personal responsibility for their systems anymore, operating under the delusion that a commercial vendor means someone to sue, thus absolving them of any sin if the system breaks down. In practice, of course, you can;t sue the vendor. I've been a company that has tried. You'll find out two things. (a) EULAs do have legal teeth. (b) Your operations people will be found negligent and ruin your case if they even once say "the system just crashed, it must be the vendor's fault", if they haven't gone to absurd lengths with debuggers and profilers.

All in all, you're better off with Open Source - there, your operations people HAVE NO LAME EXCUSES.

Re:When are Java developers going to wake up?

[NeoBeans]

IBM's participation in JavaONE probably reflects an attempt to curtail spending at trade shows that won't increase their bottom line.

If you look at IBM's involvement in the Java Community Process for J2SE and J2EE you'll see there are over 20 IBM-led efforts under the umbrella of a process that is managed by Sun.

Sun may not have product to capitalize on Java, but as a steward of the standard, the company is still in a uniquely powerful position.