GlassFish Portfolio

When I started learning Java, I downloaded the JDK from Sun like I assume everyone else did. There was one bundle that came with GlassFish, which is an application server from Sun Microsystems. I opted not to get it.

Sun apparently is releasing more stuff for GlassFish with their GlassFish Portfolio. This is a four piece set of products that are related to GlassFish. Now these products are not for free. I think this is one place where Sun plans to actually make some money.

The GlassFish Portfolio consists of the GlassFish web stack, Enterprise Service Bus, Web Space Server, and Management Toolkit. Before downloading the JDK and seeing the GlassFish option, I had never even heard of GlassFish. I suppose that means that not many people use it. Websphere and Weblogic seem to own the application server market. Perhaps some add-ons like the GlassFish Portfolio may help Sun try to even the gap. Alas they may already be too far behind in the race.

Welcome to Java

I have spent the majority of my career on a single project. To stay aboard, I have moved from one company to another. This is a big government contract. After nearly 10 years, the daily challenges are still exciting.

When I first took the job, it was just what I was looking for. There were some Visual C++/MFC applications. The back end was the Oracle database that I wanted to learn. Things seemed great.

Somewhere in the last few years, the customer wanted to go to the web. This sparked all kinds of work to produce an enterprise edition rewrite of the system. That proved harder than it sounds.

Part of the rewrite was to migrate the client server applications to some Java on the back end. I was clueless on how to help this effort. Luckily it was a drastic failure and the upgrade got shelved. However it may come back from the grave. I need to be ready next time. It is now time to learn Java.