Which Application Server to use with MySQL?

At the MySQL User Conference last week I had a number of attendees come up to me to ask which application server they should be using with MySQL. They were looking for something that was fast, lightweight and compatible. To me the choice was obvious -- GlassFish! 

So why GlassFish?

Project GlassFish, was launched when Sun open-sourced its application server and the Java EE Reference Implementation, was Sun's first step toward open-sourcing the entire Java platform. Less than a year after the initial launch, the GlassFish community delivered the first release of the GlassFish Application Server, a production-quality, Java EE-compliant application server, followed by a second release in 2007. Today, GlassFish is the leading open-source and open community platform for building and deploying next-generation applications and services. The GlassFish application server has been downloaded more than 18 million times since 2006.

Another choice might be Red Hat's JBoss application server that was released in 2006. Although JBoss has had some success in the past, I would caution that there are some issues around  backward compatibility and features that are not supported in the commercial release of the product. In addition it seems to be pretty far behind as far as latest features around JavaEE are concerned.

In contrast, the GlassFish application server is backward-compatible; features released today will be supported in future freely available versions as well as future Sun-supported commercial versions of GlassFish Enterprise Server. Additionally, the freely available GlassFish application server is ready for production right out of the box. For these reasons, I recommend GlassFish application server over JBoss!

Tomcat application server is extremely popular with Java developers who only want to only use servlets, but it doesn't support the full Java EE stack. So why use only a bit of Java when you can use the full reference implementation?

Posted at 05:16AM Apr 29, 2009 by Mark Herring in GlassFish  |  Comments[0]  |  | |

GlassFish, LAMP and Weblogic.

Just received notification about an exciting new webinar on GlassFish and LAMP is scheduled for May 13th. (Yes we like the 13th.. lucky for some). There are many developers using LAMP out there, but I also hear from enterprises that the issue soon becomes how to support and handle the integration issues around the LAMP components. For a view of how we have solved this issue be sure to sign up here.

While you are waiting for the webinar, you might be interested in this white paper on how GlassFish can be a great alternative to WebLogic. Give it a read especially if you are looking on how to migrate your non-ERP type applications to way lower TCO offering.

 -Mark

Posted at 06:00AM Apr 16, 2009 by Mark Herring in Application Infrastructure  |  Comments[0]  |  | |

Saving Over Oracle with GlassFish ESB -- A real case study

I just spent some time reviewing what Pretium Telecom did with GlassFish ESB and their business results. Pretium Telecom is a large provider of fixed telephony in the Netherlands. The company’s 130 employees provide traditional, low-cost services to over 200,000 customers.

So what were their business benefits of using GlassFish over Oracle?

• Accelerated development cycles by 40%–50%
• Cut the total cost of ownership by approximately 50%
• Gained the ability to launch a new VoIP offering three months earlier than projected

These are amazing results, but I can't say we were too shocked. Our TCO calculator might give you some insight into what you can save. On a 20 socket machine supporting 5,000 employees Oracle cost about $8M, whereas GlassFish ESB comes in at $2M.

Perhaps you are in the same place as Pertium and want to save millions, but are not sure about whether Open Source and GlassFish ESB is ready for prime time. I recommend you download GlassFish ESB and give it a try and hopefully you can be our next success story. I think Ruud de Greef, Chief Information Officer, at Pretium Telecom, says it the best:

“ In the past, we were suspicious of open source for business deployments, but there has been a big change in open-source technologies over the last couple of years. Products like GlassFish ESB and GlassFish Enterprise Server deliver a professional and reliable environment to base your business processes on. ”

Read more on Pretium Telecom here.

Posted at 05:02AM Apr 14, 2009 by Mark Herring in SOA & Services  |   |  | |

Gartner's View on GlassFish from Jess Thompson

Just wanted to give you a pointer to a great article by Jess Thompson from Gartner on GlassFish Portfolio. This article does a great job of setting up the case on why enterprises should look at open source (and why they shouldn't) and how GlassFish helps address these issues...

Give it a read and let me know what you think.

If you want more details on GlassFish check out http://www.sun.com/glassfish.

Posted at 08:07AM Apr 10, 2009 by Mark Herring in GlassFish  |  Comments[0]  |  | |

GlassFish ESB Saving Lives?

As a technology vendor, it is always interesting to see what our customers are using our technology to solve. Some projects are interesting, others border on the mundane, and yet others really have the potential to change the world. The Nationwide Health Information Network (NHIN) project is one of those that will have a dramatic and positive impact to millions of people. 

Imagine the possibilies and lives that will be saved by having health care records being shared between providers. Suddenly going on vacation and having to go to a strange hospital will be much safer: the doctors there will know about your ailments, drug interactions, even if you can't communicate with them. Deaths due to drugs being prescribed to patients that are alergic to them will hopefully decrease because the drug allergy information will be shared across providers. Naturally this is a complex problem to solve with many issues around privacy and security, but I am very happy to know that GlassFish ESB is at the heart of the solution.

Need more details:

• eWeek: Sun Software Key to Electronic Medical Records Network
• ZDNet: Sun showing NHIN work at HIMSS
• Interview with Vish Sankaran (Program Director Federal Health Architecture)
• Or the over 140 articles and counting on Google...

Posted at 03:40PM Apr 08, 2009 by Mark Herring in Application Infrastructure  |  Comments[0]  |  | |

The problem with Proprietary Middleware Stacks

There is a great saying that it took a long time to invent the wheel, but replicating it is easy! I think the main challenge with proprietary stacks is exactly this -- paying for a business model on a wheel that in its day was revolutionary, but today is old and not effective. Does your car still drive on a granite wheel -- didn't think so! The open source "wheel" has taken the best designs from the proprietary world and enhanced them, and in doing so created some great new solutions at lower costs.

What I am not suggesting is rip-and-replace! But I am suggesting you look at your whole application needs and see when open source alternatives like GlassFish will work.We have seen some really interesting cost savings by using GlassFish over the proprietary alternatives -- savings of up to $3M in some instances.

 Now before you think that open source is just for those hot web 2.0 garage startups.. consider that T-Mobile is using GlassFish with some great results.

"High availability allows us to meet our stringent uptime requirements and the Sun GlassFish Enterprise Server enables us to cost-effectively deploy new services while meeting our performance and availability requirements," said Erez Yarkoni, vice president, T-Mobile, USA.

The other issue to consider with proprietary vendors is lock-in. Basically for the proprietary vendor lock-in is key to success. With lock-in they become a sole source vendor for your needs and they can charge what they like -- and may have!

The combination of high-cost, proprietary products and vendor lock-in frequently constrains businesses from embarking on new software initiatives -- something that customers I speak to can't afford to have happen.

Additionally, the capital expenditures and associated financial risk required to deploy proprietary products can either delay the profitability gains of new software initiatives or simply prevent enterprises from attempting innovative ideas to drive new revenue streams.

For example, proprietary products from BEA Systems/Oracle are far more expensive to acquire than open-source alternatives and don't offer enterprise developers the flexibility to customize to fit the business' changing needs. Although developers can submit feedback, the cycle of development is long and, with a limited number of engineers working on the software, new features and updates are delivered much more slowly than in open source.

To ensure that problems can be addressed as quickly as possible and to reduce operational costs, enterprises can chose a comprehensive open-source platform backed by an established commercial entity that provides support and understands the interdependencies not only of that platform but of other third-party products that are already in the enterprise's IT infrastructure.

 I invite you to share your story, or read other stories from real users: http://blogs.sun.com/stories/

Posted at 05:14PM Apr 05, 2009 by Mark Herring in GlassFish  |   |  | |

Open Source and the Enterprise

I keep hearing from customers that I visit that cost is becoming (or has become) THE issue to deal with in 2009. More and more of these customers (and they are the large enterprises) are opening the dialog with "How do we save by using Open Source?" It is amazing that just 3-6 months ago open source was a hit and miss topic, but now it seems to be firmly in the mainstream. 

Most enterprises that are considering open-source software typically want the best product from the different categories to make up a complete Web application platform: a Web server (like Apache), an application server (like GlassFish or JBoss), scripting (like PHP and Ruby), an Enterprise Service Bus (like OpenESB or MuleSource) and a portal (like LifeRay). Adopting this approach has some significant benefits but also presents its own challenges:

• Cost/time to integrate the disparate projects together
• Ability to effectively patch and maintain the disparate projects
• Support of the product if/when problems arise and who can provide a fix for the product to address business critical issues

I would love to year how you are trying to handle these challenges. I know my colleges working with the proprietary vendors have decided to declare open source more expensive than proprietary, but I find that argument nonsensical. 

I promise to publish any results here as well as how we are trying to solve this at Sun. Our approach might surprise you.. more to come...

Posted at 10:50AM Apr 03, 2009 by Mark Herring in Application Infrastructure  |  Comments[0]  |  | |