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WLS 9.0 makes it easy to deploy
Posted On June 15, 2007 by Madhu AP filed under Miscellaneous
1. Which are the System Admin features new in WLS 9.0?
BEA WebLogic Server 9.0 focuses on simplifying and streamlining the day-to-day management of production systems with minimal disruption to live production environments. A comprehensive, centralized diagnostics service allows administrators to identify and resolve issues in real time and accommodates the integration of third-party analytical tools. This release of BEA WebLogic Server introduces a more extensible, "portalized" Administration Console as well as a tightly controlled, predictable process for managing changes to a domain's configuration, regardless of the configuration tool used. A new scripting tool, a simplified domain directory structure and modular deployment capabilities automate and facilitate application configuration and deployment.
2. Why is there a separate scripting tool for administering WLS 9.0?
The WebLogic Scripting Tool (WLST) is a command-line scripting interface that system administrators and operators use to monitor and manage WebLogic Server instances and domains. The WLST scripting environment is based on the Java scripting interpreter, Jython. In addition to WebLogic scripting functions, you can use common features of interpreted languages, including local variables, conditional variables and flow control statements. WLST provides administrators of WLS with the most flexible way to into their existing management environment and process.
3. Are there any plans for supporting WLS using standard scripting languages such as Perl or Python?
The WLST scripting environment is based on the Java scripting interpreter, Jython. In addition to WebLogic scripting functions, you can use common features of interpreted languages, including local variables, conditional variables and flow control statements. WebLogic Server developers and administrators can extend the WebLogic scripting language to suit their environmental needs by following the Jython language syntax.
4. What are the new deployment features in WLS 9.0?
BEA WebLogic Server 9.0 offers a variety of deployment management services. These include:
Side-by-side deployment: WLS 9.0 enables deployment of multiple versions of the same application across a WebLogic cluster; new client requests are routed to the new version and there is no impact on existing clients of the older version. WLS 9.0 will automatically retire the older version of the application once all existing clients have completed their processing. This eliminates the need to build out replicated versions of production environments, deploy two different versions in two environments or use a load-balancer to cut over application traffic to the new version.
HTTP Session, EJB, JMS, RMI, and JDBC availability: WLS provides clustering support for Servlets and JSPs by replicating the HTTP session state of clients that access clustered Servlets and JSPs. BEA WebLogic Server can maintain HTTP session states in memory, a file system or database.
MAN and WAN clustering: The state of an HTTP session running on a server instance in one cluster can be replicated on a server instance in another cluster. The clusters can be located on different LANs within the same MAN, or be in geographically distant locations within a WAN. Upon failure of the primary server instance, another member of the same cluster can recover the session data from the remote instance (in another cluster) and make it available in the primary cluster. If no members of the cluster in which the primary failed are available, the request could failover to the remote cluster hosting the session replica.
Server failover: BEA WebLogic Server 9.0 now monitors its own health. It allows itself to be brought down and automatically migrated to another location if it senses that its systems are failing. In addition, a JMS implementation leverages the automatic migration function to provide automatic JMS Server failover.
Zero-downtime upgrades: Upgrading and migrating BEA WebLogic Server domains has been made even easier. A new upgrade wizard, which can be run in silent or GUI mode, provides complete and seamless migration of existing domain artifacts, the new 9.0 domain.
Singleton services: BEA WebLogic Server features for increasing the availability of singleton services include support for multiple thread pools to harden individual servers against failures, health monitoring and life cycle APIs to support detection restart of failed and ailing servers, the ability to upgrade software without interrupting services and the ability to automatically migrate server-dependent services like JMS servers and JTA transaction recovery services.
5. Where do you position WLS 9.0 vis-à-vis the Open Source web servers that are getting more stable day by day?
It is important to understand that application servers are not just compliant with a programmatic interface such as J2EE. While WLS 9.0 offers the most comprehensive support for multi-programming models, including support for leading open source frameworks such as Beehive and Spring, giving developers the widest choice of development models, WLS 9.0 differentiates itself from other application servers in the underlying kernel that is underneath that provides the performance, reliability, scalability and manageability that is extremely critical in deploying large-scale mission critical applications. For example, the new side-by-side deployment features essentially eliminate planned downtime for application and even system software upgrades. Failover support over WAN or MAN addresses high availability requirements of data center catastrophes. In terms of performance, BEA has recently set a new performance record, surpassing all previous SPECjAppServer2004 benchmark results. Features like the above are just some examples of how BEA continues to push innovation forward.
6. What is your opinion on non-EJB based frameworks such as Spring?
We think it is a great technology and can increase productivity for developers. That is why we have decided to support Spring in WLS 9.0. Our intention is to support all leading open source frameworks directly. Upcoming versions of our development tool, WebLogic Workshop, will allow applications to be built or blended from leading open source frameworks, including Spring, Apache Beehive, Apache Struts, etc. and then be deployed on BEA WebLogic Server. The tools will be designed to allow customers to have the ability to configure and monitor Spring modules through the WebLogic Server administrative console.
7. How has WLS resolved deployment issues in J2EE?
In J2EE 1.4, the JSR-88 specification defines a standard API application configuration and deployment to a target application server environment. WebLogic Server 9.0 implements the JSR-88 Service Provider Interface (SPI) plug-in and model plug-in to comply with the J2EE 1.4 deployment specification. WebLogic Server's new deployment API implements and extends JSR-88 to support the advanced deployment capabilities. The basic JSR-88 configuration process does not support migration of an application configuration from one environment to another within an organization. You can redeploy a revised version of a production application alongside the older version of the application without affecting existing clients to the application and without interrupting the availability of the application to new client requests.
The Administration Console in WebLogic Server 9.0 enables you to edit the WebLogic Server deployment configuration for any deployed application or module, regardless of whether the application was deployed using an archive file or an exploded archive directory. Changes to the deployment configuration are now persisted to a WebLogic Server deployment plan, leaving the original deployment descriptors untouched. Using a deployment plan preserves the original deployment files and makes use of WebLogic Server extensions to the JSR-88 deployment specification introduced in J2EE 1.4.
8. What are the key messages for developers looking at switching over to WLS?
WLS 9.0 is the only zero downtime application server in the market. The WebLogic enterprise grade kernel keeps application running, even when deploying a new version of applications, changing configurations or failing over to cross WAN or MAN.
WLS 9.0 multi-language programming model supports the largest variety of access to the underlying kernel providing the greatest flexibility, including support for open source frameworks.
WLS 9.0 has been able to show that we are able to achieve the above using less hardware, software and labor than competing products, thus reducing the total cost of ownership of WLS powered applications.
BEA WebLogic Server 9.0 focuses on simplifying and streamlining the day-to-day management of production systems with minimal disruption to live production environments. A comprehensive, centralized diagnostics service allows administrators to identify and resolve issues in real time and accommodates the integration of third-party analytical tools. This release of BEA WebLogic Server introduces a more extensible, "portalized" Administration Console as well as a tightly controlled, predictable process for managing changes to a domain's configuration, regardless of the configuration tool used. A new scripting tool, a simplified domain directory structure and modular deployment capabilities automate and facilitate application configuration and deployment.
2. Why is there a separate scripting tool for administering WLS 9.0?
The WebLogic Scripting Tool (WLST) is a command-line scripting interface that system administrators and operators use to monitor and manage WebLogic Server instances and domains. The WLST scripting environment is based on the Java scripting interpreter, Jython. In addition to WebLogic scripting functions, you can use common features of interpreted languages, including local variables, conditional variables and flow control statements. WLST provides administrators of WLS with the most flexible way to into their existing management environment and process.
3. Are there any plans for supporting WLS using standard scripting languages such as Perl or Python?
The WLST scripting environment is based on the Java scripting interpreter, Jython. In addition to WebLogic scripting functions, you can use common features of interpreted languages, including local variables, conditional variables and flow control statements. WebLogic Server developers and administrators can extend the WebLogic scripting language to suit their environmental needs by following the Jython language syntax.
4. What are the new deployment features in WLS 9.0?
BEA WebLogic Server 9.0 offers a variety of deployment management services. These include:
Side-by-side deployment: WLS 9.0 enables deployment of multiple versions of the same application across a WebLogic cluster; new client requests are routed to the new version and there is no impact on existing clients of the older version. WLS 9.0 will automatically retire the older version of the application once all existing clients have completed their processing. This eliminates the need to build out replicated versions of production environments, deploy two different versions in two environments or use a load-balancer to cut over application traffic to the new version.
HTTP Session, EJB, JMS, RMI, and JDBC availability: WLS provides clustering support for Servlets and JSPs by replicating the HTTP session state of clients that access clustered Servlets and JSPs. BEA WebLogic Server can maintain HTTP session states in memory, a file system or database.
MAN and WAN clustering: The state of an HTTP session running on a server instance in one cluster can be replicated on a server instance in another cluster. The clusters can be located on different LANs within the same MAN, or be in geographically distant locations within a WAN. Upon failure of the primary server instance, another member of the same cluster can recover the session data from the remote instance (in another cluster) and make it available in the primary cluster. If no members of the cluster in which the primary failed are available, the request could failover to the remote cluster hosting the session replica.
Server failover: BEA WebLogic Server 9.0 now monitors its own health. It allows itself to be brought down and automatically migrated to another location if it senses that its systems are failing. In addition, a JMS implementation leverages the automatic migration function to provide automatic JMS Server failover.
Zero-downtime upgrades: Upgrading and migrating BEA WebLogic Server domains has been made even easier. A new upgrade wizard, which can be run in silent or GUI mode, provides complete and seamless migration of existing domain artifacts, the new 9.0 domain.
Singleton services: BEA WebLogic Server features for increasing the availability of singleton services include support for multiple thread pools to harden individual servers against failures, health monitoring and life cycle APIs to support detection restart of failed and ailing servers, the ability to upgrade software without interrupting services and the ability to automatically migrate server-dependent services like JMS servers and JTA transaction recovery services.
5. Where do you position WLS 9.0 vis-à-vis the Open Source web servers that are getting more stable day by day?
It is important to understand that application servers are not just compliant with a programmatic interface such as J2EE. While WLS 9.0 offers the most comprehensive support for multi-programming models, including support for leading open source frameworks such as Beehive and Spring, giving developers the widest choice of development models, WLS 9.0 differentiates itself from other application servers in the underlying kernel that is underneath that provides the performance, reliability, scalability and manageability that is extremely critical in deploying large-scale mission critical applications. For example, the new side-by-side deployment features essentially eliminate planned downtime for application and even system software upgrades. Failover support over WAN or MAN addresses high availability requirements of data center catastrophes. In terms of performance, BEA has recently set a new performance record, surpassing all previous SPECjAppServer2004 benchmark results. Features like the above are just some examples of how BEA continues to push innovation forward.
6. What is your opinion on non-EJB based frameworks such as Spring?
We think it is a great technology and can increase productivity for developers. That is why we have decided to support Spring in WLS 9.0. Our intention is to support all leading open source frameworks directly. Upcoming versions of our development tool, WebLogic Workshop, will allow applications to be built or blended from leading open source frameworks, including Spring, Apache Beehive, Apache Struts, etc. and then be deployed on BEA WebLogic Server. The tools will be designed to allow customers to have the ability to configure and monitor Spring modules through the WebLogic Server administrative console.
7. How has WLS resolved deployment issues in J2EE?
In J2EE 1.4, the JSR-88 specification defines a standard API application configuration and deployment to a target application server environment. WebLogic Server 9.0 implements the JSR-88 Service Provider Interface (SPI) plug-in and model plug-in to comply with the J2EE 1.4 deployment specification. WebLogic Server's new deployment API implements and extends JSR-88 to support the advanced deployment capabilities. The basic JSR-88 configuration process does not support migration of an application configuration from one environment to another within an organization. You can redeploy a revised version of a production application alongside the older version of the application without affecting existing clients to the application and without interrupting the availability of the application to new client requests.
The Administration Console in WebLogic Server 9.0 enables you to edit the WebLogic Server deployment configuration for any deployed application or module, regardless of whether the application was deployed using an archive file or an exploded archive directory. Changes to the deployment configuration are now persisted to a WebLogic Server deployment plan, leaving the original deployment descriptors untouched. Using a deployment plan preserves the original deployment files and makes use of WebLogic Server extensions to the JSR-88 deployment specification introduced in J2EE 1.4.
8. What are the key messages for developers looking at switching over to WLS?
WLS 9.0 is the only zero downtime application server in the market. The WebLogic enterprise grade kernel keeps application running, even when deploying a new version of applications, changing configurations or failing over to cross WAN or MAN.
WLS 9.0 multi-language programming model supports the largest variety of access to the underlying kernel providing the greatest flexibility, including support for open source frameworks.
WLS 9.0 has been able to show that we are able to achieve the above using less hardware, software and labor than competing products, thus reducing the total cost of ownership of WLS powered applications.