GlassFish Documentation: Written by the GlassFish Doc Team

Where to find information about how to embed GlassFish™ Application Server v3 Prelude.[Read More]

Sun GlassFish Enterprise Server v3 Preview is now available. This early access release showcases Java EE 6 technologies and includes a full documentation set.

The Release Notes describe Enterprise Server v3 Preview, the Quick Start Guide helps you get started quickly, and the many other guides help you make the most of Enterprise Server and its impressive capabilities. Of special note are two tutorials: First Cup: An Introduction to the Java EE Platform and Java EE 6 Tutorial, Volume I. These documents provide beginner's guides to developing enterprise applications for Enterprise Server and include working examples and instructions for creating applications with Java EE 6 technologies.

As always, your suggestions and participation are needed. Review the Preview documentation and submit your comments using the Documentation Comments wiki. Also contact the documentation team directly using the docs@glassfish.dev.java.net mailing list. We'd love to hear from you.

SailFin 1.0 is a Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) application server built on top of GlassFish v2.1. SailFin enables you to develop and deploy JSR-289-compliant SIP and converged applications.

GlassFish v2.1, the latest public release of our full-featured Java EE 5 application server, includes several bug fixes and support for new platforms, such as Windows 2008 and Apache 2.2.

The Sun-supported counterpart of SailFin 1.0 is called Sun GlassFish Communications Server 1.5. The supported version of GlassFish v2.1 is Sun GlassFish Enterprise Server 2.1.

Comprehensive and helpful documentation for SailFin and GlassFish:

- Documentation set for Sun GlassFish Communications Server 1.5/SailFin 1.0
- Documentation set for Sun GlassFish Enterprise Server 2.1/GlassFish v2.1
- SIP Servlet tutorial and screencast

To help you find the information you are looking for, we have the SailFin documentation page that has links to all SailFin tasks and provides information about SailFin's exciting new features.

Another innovative product available for use with Sun GlassFish Enterprise Server 2.1 is the GlassFish Enterprise Manager, which includes the Performance Monitor, Performance Advisor, and SNMP Monitor. The documentation for this enterprise offering is also available here.

A big "Thank You" to the members of the SailFin and GlassFish community for their contributions to the documentation!

Documentation is a great way to learn about GlassFish and related technologies. GlassFish webinars are another, and I encourage you to take advantage of them. The weekly webinars cover a wide range of topics and are free and open to the public. They're typically announced on The Aquarium (similar to this announcement for the February 19th webinar) and on community mailing lists such as users@glassfish.dev.java.net and docs@glassfish.dev.java.net. The webinar home page provides details about upcoming webinars and points to slides and recordings for those that have already happened. Just another great way to learn about GlassFish.

When I enlisted to work on the release notes for the Sun GlassFish Portfolio (the day before launch!), I had no idea what GlassFish Portfolio was. A suite? A platform? A figment of marketing imagination? The short answer---Sun GlassFish Portfolio is a set of Sun opensource components that provides the foundation to develop and deploy Web and enterprise application. Okay, not so short.

I watched some videos and clicked around some web pages, and what I think is important about this announcement is (a) the components are open-source, (b) customers can choose only those pieces they want, and (c) the pricing model. Cheaper than our competitors, but not free. Ah. Maybe this is how we make money on opensource products.

The full scoop is here: Sun GlassFish Portfolio

The release notes are here: GlassFish Portfolio Release Notes

We appreciate our community contributors and want to highlight their efforts. This first Contributor Spotlight focuses on Archana N, who attends university at Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham, Amritapuri campus, Kollam, Kerala. 
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This week The Aquarium reported that nearly 40,000 people have already registered their downloads of Sun GlassFish Enterprise Server v3 Prelude. Impressive!

But you still have not found the time to learn about this release? Or you still need to introduce another person -- who doesn't have much time to spare either -- to this release? Not a problem. In less that 10 minutes, you can explore key features of Enterprise Server v3 Prelude. How? By watching the Quick Start Guide for Enterprise Server v3 Prelude video. See it now.

Should you prefer the hands-on method, the actual "Quick Start Guide" is available online in PDF and HTML versions. In less than 30 minutes, you can install and try out the release.

After you finish your exploration, please let us know what you thought of your quick start. User comments about about GlassFish documentation are always welcome.

The documentation community's contribution to the GlassFish v3 Prelude blog fest.[Read More]

A big thanks to the FishCAT members (aka "FishCATs") who tested GlassFish v3 Prelude documentation. Of the 117 bugs, RFEs, and comments filed during the FishCAT program, 25 of those were for docs – pretty impressive! Those doc reports came from the following people (and my apologies if I missed anyone – please let me know if I did) :

• Kristian Rink
• Dick Davies
• Preetam Deshpande
• Sebastien Dionne
• Kanae Kotake
• Madhavi
• Manfred Riem
• Wolfram Rittmeyer
• Shinsuke Takeuchi
• Wim Verreycken
  

Thanks very much for your time and dedication, which were evident in the many exchanges on the quality mailing list (just look at August and September!) and in the final results. You directly improved the quality of the docs and the overall quality of the GlassFish v3 Prelude release by:

• Reviewing the guides, flagging errors and providing suggestions for improvement.
• Performing procedures and examples, verifying their accuracy and completeness.
• Testing the online help, cross-checking it against the GUI and identifying places where explanations were unclear or information was missing.
• Reviewing the man pages, testing commands and verifying the correctness and completeness of the content.

What's even more impressive is that you did all this work as unpaid volunteers (well, not counting the T-shirt), fitting it in with real jobs and school and everything else that keeps life busy. And even though the FishCAT program is officially "over" for GlassFish v3 Prelude, you're still working away – testing builds, reviewing docs, filing issues. Community at its finest.

This was the first round of FishCAT, and as with any new thing there's always room for improvement. We're thinking about that on the docs team, and would love to hear your thoughts as well. What worked and what didn't for FishCAT doc testing and review? What would you like to see done differently next time around? Any and all feedback would be greatly appreciated. Just leave a comment on this blog or send an e-mail to the docs team. And thanks again for a job very well done.

The final drafts of the GlassFish v3 Prelude documentation are available now from the GlassFishDocumentation Comments Wiki. For a list of documents to review, consult the section Guides and Tutorials - Ready for Review on the wiki page.

As the review is starting a day late, the deadline for comments is now end of day Monday, 13 October 2008.

Members of the GlassFish documentation team have asked subject matter experts individually to review sections of the documentation that apply to their area of expertise.

If you have been asked by a member of the GlassFish documentation team to review a particular section of the documentation, or are interested in the GlassFish v3 Prelude documentation, please set aside some time this week to review the documentation. The quality of your reviews has a major effect on the overall quality of the documentation.

Thank you

Paul Davies,
GlassFish Documentation Team

Mark your calendars! Final review of the GlassFish v3 Prelude documentation is scheduled for October 6th through October 10th.

Members of the GlassFish documentation team will be asking subject matter experts individually to review sections of the documentation that apply to their area of expertise. If you are asked to review a particular section of the documentation, or if you are interested in GlassFish v3 Prelude documentation, please set aside time for this review. The quality of your reviews has a major effect on the overall quality of the documentation.

Stay tuned for details about how to obtain the drafts for review and how to provide feedback. Those details will be posted on this blog and also sent to the appropriate GlassFish mailing lists such as dev, users, and docs. Thanks in advance for your attention to these reviews. They're really important.

You're invited to participate in FishCAT, the new community testing program that was recently announced by the GlassFish Quality Community. FishCAT kicks off with GlassFish v3 Prelude, and documentation reviews are an important part of the program. See the FishCAT page for details about the program and how to apply, and the documentation review page for details about documentation reviews. Submit your application right away if you're interested. The deadline for applications is August 15th, 2008.

Quality documentation is vital to a quality product. By participating in FishCAT and reviewing documentation, you can directly improve the quality of the GlassFish v3 Prelude release and greatly benefit GlassFish users and developers. FishCAT is just one way to participate in GlassFish documentation. For a list of others, see the documentation home page.

As announced by Ming, the GlassFish User FAQ has been translated into Japanese. This great work was done by the Japanese GlassFish community, in conjunction with the G11n team. The community is now translating the GlassFish Developer FAQ into Japanese. The User FAQ project was also submitted as a GlassFish Awards Program (GAP) entry. Because the User and Developer FAQs are dynamic and change often as new entries are added and existing entries are updated, the Japanese community will monitor the FAQs and make changes to the Japanese versions as necessary to keep them in sync with the English versions (or as close as possible).  

This is just one example of the translation work being done by the global GlassFish community. Community members are also translating the User FAQ into Chinese, Spanish, and Italian. Many thanks for all of these efforts, which are of great benefit to GlassFish users and developers around the world. Translation of the FAQs into other languages is also needed. If you'd like to get involved, see Translating User and Developer FAQs. Questions or comments? Contact the docs@glassfish.dev.java.net and g11n@glassfish.dev.java.net mailing lists.

Just a reminder about the GlassFish Awards Program (GAP), which was mentioned in a previous post and which offers prize money for innovation in a number of areas, including documentation. The deadline is June 30th but that doesn't mean you should wait until the last minute to get your entries in — you definitely shouldn't! You're encouraged to submit your entries now, even if they aren't completely finished, and then resubmit later as you make more progress.

Read this post on The Aquarium, then make plans to get your submissions in sooner rather than later. A lot of money is up for grabs, and it's a great opportunity for recognition, too.