GlassFish Adoption Questionnaire: Imixs Software Solutions

Full GlassFish adoption questionnaire responses from Gabi Strixner for Imixs Software Solutions.

Date : June 2007

Can you tell us about the application, site, or service in which you have adopted GlassFish?

For over 5 years now Imixs Software Solutions GmbH has developed workflow management systems for different types of workflows, especially human based workflows for business processes. Moreover Imixs Software Solutions GmbH has created an open source project to evolve the Imixs IX workflow technology to new and open standards.

Various modules taking advantage of modern standards like J2EE, EJB 2.1, Web, LDAP, Ajax and Eclipse have been developed in the past based on the platform independent IX technology. Project http://www. imixs.org includes today all components needed for an up-to-date and complete workflow management solution :

IX Workflow Modeler to model the process and steps
IX Workflow Clients for the users to handle the processes comfortable
IX Workflow Server to run, manage and control the processes

When the Java EE 5 specification was published by Sun we decided to build a Java EE 5 implementation of the IX workflow server component. In addition from switching from J2EE spec to a more extensible and scalable platform running on GlassFish, the Java EE 5 spec provides us with a variety of new opportunities to create a solid workflow implementation. We noticed lots of improvements using the Java EE 5 spec, but the most important for the Imixs IX Workflow technology are Java Persistence API (JPA), EJB 3.0, Web Services API (JAX-WS), and very simple deployment.

How and when did you first find out about GlassFish?

We first heard about GlassFish in 2005. It was very exciting to hear that Sun would consolidate the Java EE implementations into one and make ít open source.

Did you go through an evaluation process before selecting GlassFish? If so, can you tell us a little bit about the process and results?

We intended to build our new IX technology using EJB 3.0 and were hence looking for an application server which offers the complete spec. We evaluated GlassFish, Geronimo and JBoss and went for GlassFish because the server was leading in terms of EE 5 compliance and architecture. Best of all, the integrity and professional quality of the GlassFish application server convinced us. We were able to start the project rapidly and achieve great progress in the shortest time possible.

What specific version of GlassFish are you using?

V2 b42. From the beginning we wrote the implementation on GlassFish to apply the new technology. During the deployment our developers integrated every single evolution of GlassFish easily.

On what operating system do you run GlassFish? Do you use the same OS for both development and production deployment?

We developed on a Windows XP and deploy the production system on a Linux server running on various Intel-based IBM xSeries machines.

Have you purchased support for GlassFish? If not, have you though about doing so?

We did not yet purchase support. But we plan to offer a bundle with a GlassFish server and the Imixs IX Work Suite. To augment our own support we intend to add GlassFish support.

What specific features or modules of GlassFish are you using?

EJB, JPA, Servlets, JSP, JSF, Web Services, and Java DB.

What do you like most about GlassFish?

The very comfortable server console and the fantastic auto-deployment feature.

Are you using any open source or commercial frameworks or tools in your application?

Well, we are actually building the open source www.imixs.org framework to serve as a foundation to the IX Workflow. There was no need to use other open source projects since the GlassFish server provides all Java EE features, letting us develop a secure and reliable application.

Does your application use a database? If so, which one?

Yes, we developed with Java DB (Derby), but as we use EJB 3.0 we are independent from DB vendors.

Are there any figures about the scale of your adoption which you would like to share?

We found the development time to be shorter than expected, mainly because the project is very well documented and supported on forums.

How would your describe your participation in the GlassFish project?

A a user mainly, no contribution.

Is there anything else you think would be of interest in a story about your GlassFish adoption?

The GlassFish project a simple-to-administer and highly scalable server platform. It is a great basis for providing Open Source software in a demanding business context. The Imixs IX workflow technology for managing human-based business processes is more open now to many different groups of users. As more standardization such as Business Process Execution Language (BPEL) makes its way into business process management, we are looking forward to a perfect service oriented future.

Thank you Gabi for sharing your GlassFish experience!