Alexis has posted additional entries in his GlassFish à la carte series. Part I and Part II (also see Review) showed how to get a minimal distro and add components to it, including some containers; Part III shows how to create a Custom Layered Distro from GlassFish v3 using the IPS tools.

The distro only bundles pre-existing components; enough to run an ejb/jersey sample. I think that this layered distro arrangement may become quite common for distribution of packages for GFv3 and it nicely shows the power of the modularity in GFv3, IPS and the embedded IPS support in GFv3.

Alexis' examples show how to create the new package, add it to your own IPS repository, and then create a new domain to run the EJB-Jersey sample. The IPS setup is very easy thanks to the documents and binaries from IPS Best Practices project, plus the Package Prototype from Alexis. To learn about IPS, check out Producing and Maintaining Packages (specially Christophe's Prezo) and MakePkgs. All the binaries you need are included in the IPS Toolkit.

The whole thing works like a champ; excerpting some of the key commands from my shell trascript:

# Created a directory for my local repo % pkg/bin/pkg.depotd -p 10001 -d /Users/pelegri/Software/my-repo # port no. and store dir. # downloaded package prototype and renamed it as pkg_proto_epll.py % cat >LICENSE.txt # need a LICENSE file! % pkg/bin/makepkgs -s http://localhost:10001/ -b ../Sample ../Sample/pkg_proto_epll.py % bin/pkg set-publisher -P --enable -O http://pkg.glassfish.org/v3/dev dev.glassfish.org % bin/pkg set-publisher --enable -O http://localhost:10001 localRepo % bin/updatetool # screenshot % bin/pkg install sample-distro # pretty much all done % bin/asadmin create-domain --instanceport 8080 --adminport 4848 mydomain % bin/asadmin start-domain mydomain # download the jersey-ejb sample WAR file % bin/asadmin deploy ../../jersey-samples/jersey-ejb-1.1.1-ea-SNAPSHOT.war % open http://localhost:8080/jersey-ejb/ # screenshot

You probably know that the new, modular, GlassFish v3 is built from (OSGi) components that can be updated using IPS. We assemble these pieces into ready-to-go JavaEE 6 Web Profile and full JavaEE 6 bundles but they can also be used to create à la carte distributions, as Alexis shows in his latest posts.

I recommend you to at least try the first example to get a better understanding of how all these technologies work together. The beauty of GFv3 is that everything is very small and fast - I'm writing this entry from a public WiFi site with pretty moderate connectivity and I'm spending more time waiting on BSC than running the example.

Part I starts with a IPS toolkit image from IPS Best Practices. The toolkit image is 5MB (most of it is the python 2.4 runtime) and has no GlassFish in it. From there, the next step is to download the GF v3 nucleus (2.41MB), which automatically brings in Felix (564KB), Grizzly (943KB) and HK2 (565KB); the IPS packages include the relevant OSGi modules. The rest of that entry shows how to install the updatecenter IPS pkg (that is the biggest package because of python graphical toolkit) and how to use it to add the management pkg, and then creates and starts a domain.

Part II in the series shows first how to install the GFv3 Web Container; then it mirrors Jerome's recent entry on GF v3, OSGi and Spring (that portion gets a bit complex and I see that Jerome already published a simpler version). Part III will continue the main theme of creating an a la carte GF v3 that has the components you want and is yet extensible.

Do you want your favorite package to be one-click away from millions of desktops Around the World? If so, help us add these packages to the GlassFish community repositories. To help this Alexis has been writing a series of blog entries; the last entry explains Different Strategies for Different Types of Components, covering Frameworks and Libraries, Applications Running in GlassFish, Applications Independent of GlassFish and GlassFish Extensions (HK2/OSGi Components).

Previous posts covered: Overview of Concepts and Hibernate as a Sample; more posts will follow soon.

Alexis has published his second article in a series ([1]) on creating IPS packages for GlassFish v3, this time explaining how to create the Hibernate package. The latest post gives detailed instructions on the process needed, including setup, key files and directories, Authoring the Hibernate IPS package example and Publishing and testing. More entries to follow; our goal is to make it very easy for you to publish your favorite packages to the community repository so that hundreds of thousands of people can use them. Also see other entries tagged as IPS and UpdateCenter

Alexis has started a new series to document / encourage more IPS packages for our GFv3-based repository. The first post introduces the packaging and repository concepts and provides links to a number of entry points like the UpdateCenter2 and GlassFish-Repo projects. Alexis's next post will use as an example the existing hibernate package in the v3 repository; then he will document how to create these packages for frameworks, Java EE applications, standalone applications, and GlassFish extensions. Check them out and let us know how the whole experience works for you; our goal is to improve the process. Other related entries are tagged IPS

GlassFish v3 uses EclipseLink as the default JPA provider but it supports Hibernate equally well, and, thanks to the benefits of IPS and the UpdateCenter, that's just a click away: just fire the updatetool and clicking on the package. For more details - but just a few more, there is really not much to tell - check on Mitesh's writeup.

The JSF team has released a New Version of JSF 2.0 (release notes, changelog, JSF). We welcome and encourage feedback, although note this is an early access, spec and implementation-wise. You can install the ZIP manually or the IPS repositories automatically using either the admin console or the update tool. The repositories are very convenient but check what is your preferred repository and remember to set your "View All Versions!" - see ScreenShot.

We are working on improving the experience of using the repositories; your feedback is very appreciated.

Version 2.1 of the IPS-based, multi-platform, package management system is now available for Download. Full details are available in the Release Notes but Tom's announcement lists the highlights and Joe provides an screencast of the features. Probably the most significant new feature in 2.1 is entitlement support, which will enables us to use it to deliver our commercial products. The first GlassFish product that will use the new release is WebSynergy, now "almost out".

The team is already working on version 2.2 to fixing some bugs and add features / improvements, including some issues I stepped on while trying out the latest JSF Package; I'll try to write about those later in the weekend (... done).

Some recent news of interest:

A compilation of today's news of interest:

With GlassFish v3, we're moving from a home-grown packaging and update mechanism used today in GlassFish v2 to IPS. Jim has a detailed write-up about how to build an update center module for GlassFish v3.

Jim covers setting up the tools if you're not using OpenSolaris, module configuration (there is no file format and packaging per say), setting up a repository, and browsing existing repositories (simply point your browser to the magic URL).

The objective for the GlassFish Update Center remains the same - easily expose your software add-ons and updates to both internal of external users (4+ Million GlassFish downloads a year).

Hudson is now available as an IPS package, joining the existing Debian, OpenSUSE, and FreeBSD packages. The IPS package is available here; Kohsuke provides Complete Instructions on how to install it; pretty straight forward, althought it currently requires a couple of extra steps. One of the benefits of Kohsuke doing this is that it helps us become more familiar with IPS. Also check this comparison between IPS and apt-get commands, and these doc pages: pfexec, svcadm and svccfg. Other related entries are tagged under Hudson and IPS.

The new OpenSolaris-branded distribution was launched at CommunityOne (PR, GetIt); together with efforts like OpenSolaris.COM and TheObservatory it is intended to help the users of OpenSolaris complementing the developer-focused OpenSolaris.ORG.

I think will see significant increased adoption of OpenSolaris in the next few months. Other trends that will help are the increased adoption of VirtualBox (home page, vb at TA, LinuxJournal Award), the new IPS package system, and more familiarization with features like ZFS, DTrace and IPS.

Several people in GlassFish have started doing more things with OpenSolaris and we will track them through TA. Here are some useful initial pointers: • Installing OpenSolaris on VB on MacOSX. • Official OS Docs • Amitsaha's IPS Overview and official Getting Started with IPS document. • Alexis' GF v2 on OpenSolaris and official Installing GFv2 from IPS document. • Arun's JRuby on Rails an MySQL on VB

Chris has a very detailed analysis of how to use IPS to package OpenDS. A bit on the long side, but I'd recommend it if you are interested in IPS. IPS is the format we are going to use with the next version of the GlassFish Update Center. IPS is also the format used in OpenSolaris but we are going to use it in an OS-independent manner. And, before you ask, no, we are not going to limit ourselves to delivering only IPS packages.

Check Chris's entry at OpenDS in IPS format. Feedback here or at Chris's blog.

Quick roundup on Hudson news:

• Kohsuke is looking for an IPS maintainer. • Hudson and... Grails, JRuby and Cobertura. • Presentation at FOSDEM - Blog and interview • Kind words - Hudson Rocks, Hudson Love, More Love (and some gripes).