Overview of the WebSphere Application Server Community Edition

IBM had announced the launch of their Community Edition version of the WebSphere Application Server. The application server is based on the Apache Geronimo.
My observations on the same..

1. Initial download was very smooth. The zip file was just about ~42 MB. Small footprint is sweet.

2. Installation of the server is another plus. Easy and intuitive. Any one can install. the whole installation footprint was just ~95 Mb. Coming from IBM, thats another big plus.

3. Got the server started. The start up time was just about 30 seconds. Couldn't believe.

4. Opened the Admin Console. Now, the first thing it asked was userid/pwd. Could not find the same anywhere. Had to open the Infocenter Help for help. BTW, the default userid/pwd is system/manager. Reminded me of Oracle DB days.

5. Once logged in, the interface was bare minimum but covered most of the things. Like all J2EE 1.4 servers, it provides a platform for multi-tier enterprise applications, including support for

* Java Servlets
* JavaServer Pages (JSPs)
* Enterprise JavaBeans (EJBs)
* Java Database API (JDBC) for data access
* J2EE Connector Architecture (JCA)
* Java Message Service (JMS)
* Java Naming and Directory Interface (JNDI)
* Java Transaction API (JTA)
* Java API for XML-Based RPS (JAX-RPC) including support for web services
* J2EE Management Model
* J2EE Management Extensions API (JMX)

6. Next step is to try and deploy some application and see how easy or difficult it is. Another thing, I want to try is to try deploying applications developed for WAS Developer/Enterprise Edition and see what all we need to do to migrate and deploy on the WAS community ed.

I will blog the same next time.