There is a new patch release for GlassFish v2 (U2) available to commercial customers of GlassFish Enterprise Server (aka Sun Java System Application Server). This fourth patch addresses 11 new defects (cumulative of 58 since U2) plus provides updates to OpenMQ/JMQ and the Load Balancer.

For more details check: • GF Enterprise Support Model • GFv2 Family Overview • GFv2 U2 patch 4 Overview, Defect Lists, Links, etc • Subscriptions Site • GlassFish For Business blog

Project WebSynergy Stable Build 2 [download] is now available! This build represents a significant milestone for the team and establishes a lot of the groundwork for the future features. In addition, summer vacations and name searches have delayed us somewhat, but we are very close to getting the external community site established (see my detailed blog post for details). Future features include exposing more Presence features, authorization and identity-based content delivery via OpenSSO integration, expanded CMS features, and IPS/Update Center support (e.g.by making a v3 module). Development tools for WebSynergy are also rapidly evolving to track the latest features in WebSynergy: Portal Pack Milestone 1 for NetBeans 6.5 is now out. The project is shaping up to really be a revolution in Sun portal. Nice work!

It's time for another update on the various GlassFish releases roadmaps. Harpreet Singh has just posted a updated draft schedule for GlassFish v2.1, the next major public release of the v2 branch (as of this writing, the current public release is v2ur2).

While GlassFish v2.1 is scheduled to ship in its final version in December, the team is also working on the v3 branch and will actually ship the v3 prelude release (Roadmap) in a couple of months (we just passed code freeze).

Let's not forget to mention the "patch" releases for customers with a GlassFish subscription. GlassFish 2ur2 Patch 2 is the latest release there. You can follow these releases tailored for production usage on the GlassFishForBusiness. Finally, Sailfin V1 alpha shipped recently. This version is aligned with v2.1 mentioned at the beginning of this note.

A concise compilation of today's news of interest to TheAquarium readers:

GlassFish v2 U2 patch 2 is now available to Sun enterprise customers of Sun GlassFish Server. Check out the details at GlassFish For Business: • Sun's Commercial Support for GlassFish Server • Overview of GFv2 Releases • GF v2 U2 patch 1 (SJS AS 9.1 U2 patch 1) - First commercial patch release. • GF v2 U2 patch 2 (SJS AS 9.1 U2 patch 2) - Second commercial patch release.

One more note from Ryan on his JSF 2.0 Preview series. This one covers View Scope, Component Implicit EL Object and FacesContext Attributes Map. Collecting them all chronologically for ease of references: • Part 1 - Packaging / Project Staging • Part 2.1 - Resources • Part 2.2 - Resource APIs • Part 2.3 - Resources and EL • Part 3 - Publish/Subscribe Event System • Part 4 - Resource Re-location • Part 5 - EDR1 Potpourri (just added)

Ryan's note completes the new features in EDR1. To install it you can follow the instructions in the Release Notes.

The image shown with this entry is a drawing of La Mojarra Stela 1 from research lead by Terrence Kaufman - see the Larger Image.

The GlassFish Server has implemented Server-Side Includes since early GFv2 (see Feb 07 entry); starting with GFv3 this feature will be supported formally. Check Shing Wai's SSI Announcement where he describes how to create SSI files and how to enable and configure their processing. Enjoy!

Ryan has written two more notes on his JSF 2.0 Preview series. Collecting them all chronologically for ease of references: • Part 1 - Packaging / Project Staging • Part 2.1 - Resources • Part 2.2 - Resource APIs • Part 2.3 - Resources and EL • Part 3 - Publish/Subscribe Event System (just added) • Part 4 - Resource Re-location (just added)

Ryan is also leading the Mojarra Implementation, the production-ready, Reference Implementation that will be used in GlassFish v3, and he also just announced the Early Access Implementation.

JSF's adoption seems to continue to be strong and to grow. I am beginning to think the adoption is bimodal, it depends very much on what market/geography one considers. For example, see Kito's JSF Jobs writeup.

Note: also see reviews/summaries of Ryan's posts by Ed and in earlier TA's spotlights: here and here.

Over the weekend I added some entries to GlassFishForBusiness to describe the GFv2 releases. GFB is intended to track Sun's offerings to help you use the GlassFish Server in production; unlike TA, GFB is updated only occasionally so you may want to subscribe to its News Feed. The new entries are:

• Overview of GFv2 Releases • GF v2 (SJS AS 9.1) - First public release • GF v2 U1 (SJS AS 9.1 U1) - Public Update Release • GF v2 U2 (SJS AS 9.1 U2) - Second public Update Release. • GF v2 U2 patch 1 (SJS AS 9.1 U2 patch 1) - First commercial patch release. Patches come out every 6-8 weeks as part of Sun's Enterprise Support. GFv2U2 was going to be our first patch but became a public release to align with other releases.

Also recall that we will switch to Sun GlassFish Enterprise Server for Sun's distribution during the GFv2.1 release cycle. Until then those distributions will continue to use the old Sun Java System Application Server (or SJSAS).

Ah, the picture is that of Messier Objects, from his "Catalogue des Nébuleuses et des Amas d'Étoiles" (Wikipedia, Large Image).

Earlier in the year Ryan (Mr JSF RI/Mojarra) started a series on the new JSF 2.0 features. Ryan's first entry covered the notion of Project Stages and then he started on Resources. The first entry on that series covered Packaging and the next one was on the APIs backing resources. Ryan just published a last entry in that series: Accessing Resources from Expression Language. Since Ryan is also the implementer all these examples are grounded in the RI and he privately told me that there should be an EA release out "any day now". Stay tuned and we will let you know.

We are regularly adding more modules to the two (v2/v3) GlassFish Update Center(s) and it is a bit hard to track what's available there today.

You could just fire your updatetool but I've done some screenshots to save you time and encourage you to use the tool: • v2 Update Center (Clip, Full Window) • v3 Update Center (Clip, Full Window).

PS. I think the right answer is that one should be able to point the browser to the repository to browse; that's coming.

Dick ("Number9"), a happy GlassFish v2 customer (lots of nice content here), has a review of GlassFish v3 TP2. He goes through the user experience of installing, starting and updating (web UI) the application server. It also details simple deployment and where to find documentation.

Dick is very much production-focused (not that it's a bad thing ! ;) so it may be useful to add that GlassFish v3 TP2 also offers an update tool to install one or all of the following: EJB 3.1 preview, jRubyOnRails (no more WAR packaging required), Grails, Jersey, metro, and jMaki.

GlassFish v3 TP2 is available for download from http://glassfish.org/downloads/v3 (21 Megs).

The NetBeans team released a new NB + MySQL + GF bundle (download) a couple of weeks ago but I didn't time to write about it. The bundle includes: • NetBeans 6.1 • GlassFish v2 UR2 • MySQL Community Server See reviews and comments from James - a frequent NetBeans blogger - and Colin - a frequent MySQL blogger -

The Spring Framework (2.5.4) is now available at the GlassFish v2 Update Center (UC@TA). Installation should be straight-forward: after installing GlassFish v2, run the updatecenter via: $GLASSFISH_ROOT/updatecenter/bin/updatetool There are a couple of post-intallation steps to do; check out the details at Pramod's Note and let us know of your experience, positive or negative.

Note this is the GF v2 update center. And thanks to Rajeshaw to help pushing the module out.

Anybody that has been in the software industry for any time knows that roadmaps are always "work in progress". With that caveat, here are the latest news: • GFv2 UR2, this Thursday (wiki page, Msg) • GFv2.1, moved out to Fall 08 (wiki page, Harpreet's blog, Msg) • GFv3 TP2, JavaOne 08 (wiki page) GFv2 UR2 has a bunch of bug fixes so you should consider it if you are using GFv2. GFv2.1 will continue to be aligned and driven by Sailfin.

GFv3 TP2 is a "Technology Preview" release; we will provide a sneak peak at CommunityOne and will be demoed at JavaOne.

Added - GFv2 UR2 has been pushed out til Monday.