[infinispan-dev] JCache integration with Wildfly provided configuration

[Paul Ferraro]

----- Original Message -----
> From: "Christian Beikov" <christian at sweazer.com>
> To: infinispan-dev at lists.jboss.org
> Sent: Sunday, August 9, 2015 12:02:13 PM
> Subject: [infinispan-dev] JCache integration with Wildfly provided	configuration
> 
> Hello,
> 
> I am using Infinispan 7.2.3.Final within Wildfly 9.0.1 and I would like to
> use the JCache integration but I struggle a bit.
> 
> I configured the JGroups subsystem in the standalone.xml of my Wildfly
> installation to enable clustering of Infinispan caches. That works as
> expected, but I wasn't sure how I would have my caches clustered too. I
> thought of some possible solutions but they both aren't really what I am
> looking for.
> 
> 
>     1. Put the cache container configuration into standalone.xml
>     2. Copy the JGroups configuration and create a new transport in a custom
>     infinispan configuration
> 
> When doing 1. I can't really use the JCache integration because there is no
> way to tell the caching provider, that I want a CacheManager for a specific
> cache container. If you would recommend doing 1. then it would be nice if
> the caching provider would not only accept file URIs, but also something
> like JNDI names. By doing that, I could reference existing cache containers
> which at least solves the problem with the JCache integration. Still I would
> prefer option 2. because I wouldn't have to change the standalone.xml every
> time I add a cache.

The trouble with JCache integration into WildFly is that JCache is not an EE spec - and lacks any details for how cache resources should be managed by a container - or how a user would go about accessing container managed caches.  Nor is there any concept of sharing cache resources between applications (i.e. each manages the cache lifecycle manually) - or about isolation of cache entries beyond ClassLoader.  The API itself couples your code to a specific JCache implementation, since the URI of a cache manager is, by nature, provider specific.
Consequently, we've deferred integrating JCache into WildFly until it's next evolution (i.e. 1.1/2.0) - or unless it somehow gets pulled into EE8.

Consequently, if you really want to use the JCache API, you'll have to stick with option #2 for now.

> When doing 2. I can use the infinispan configuration file as URI when
> creating the cache manager so the JCache integration works without a
> problem. The only thing that is bothering me is, that I have to copy the
> JGroups configuration to have a separate transport for my applications cache
> container. I can't seem to reference the transport that I configured in the
> standalone.xml nor does it default to that. I would really like to reuse the
> JGroup channel that is already established.

Infinispan requires a separate jgroups channel per cache manager - this is a limitation of Infinispan itself.  The only means of changing this is via a custom Transport implementation (as we do in WildFly).
WildFly works around this limitation by providing Infinispan with a unique ForkChannel using a common JChannel.  You might try configuring Infinispan with a custom transport based on the implementation from WildFly.  See:
https://github.com/wildfly/wildfly/blob/9.0.1.Final/clustering/infinispan/extension/src/main/java/org/jboss/as/clustering/infinispan/ChannelTransport.java

> What I would like to know is, whether there is a possibility to make use of
> the JGroups configuration I did in the standalone.xml. If there isn't, what
> should I do when wanting to cluster my caches? Just go with option 1?

Not without customization, see above.

> Regards,
> Christian Beikov
> 
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