[jboss-dev] JBoss Bootstrap, Embedded & Reloaded

[Matt Wringe]

On Wed, 2009-04-08 at 07:50 -0400, Stan Silvert wrote:
> Andrew Lee Rubinger wrote:
> > Stan Silvert wrote:
> >> It needs to be easier than using Cargo.  Right now I can use Cargo to 
> >> start/deploy/test/stop.  I do that every day from both Maven and 
> >> Ant.  I don't need to use any API at all.
> >>
> >> The problem is that Cargo is slow because it has to copy a new 
> >> configuration.  Embedded should be faster.  If it's not faster and 
> >> easier to configure than Cargo then you've lost.  Note that this 
> >> might just mean having JBoss Embedded as a Cargo-supported container.
> >
> > Could you link to some example of the JBossAS Cargo plugin where you 
> > use that API?  Even better if its something I can easily run.  I've 
> > not used Cargo standalone yet (only via the Maven2 plugin, which 
> > prompted me to make the JBossAS Maven Plugins, a wrapper around 
> > server-manager).
> >
> > S,
> > ALR
> >
> Just check out the whole project:
> http://www.jboss.org/jsfunit/source-repository.html
> 
> And run it:
> http://www.jboss.org/jsfunit/building-jsfunit.html
> 
> Also see "Building and Running Tests" at the bottom of this page:
> http://www.jboss.org/community/docs/DOC-10967
> 
> I only use it from Maven (and I do some antrun stuff from Maven so I can 
> test an Ant environment).  This is the way I run the JSFUnit test 
> suite.  I don't see why I would want to use the Cargo API directly.  I 
> can just declare everything in Maven or Ant and I'm ready to run tests.  
> The improvement I see for Embedded would be mostly about speed and ease 
> of configuration.  Right now the default container for Cargo is Jetty.  
> But with a fast startup time, I can see Embedded taking Jetty's place.

The speed of JBoss on Cargo should probably be improved. 
With JBoss we need to copy over a lot more files in comparison to Tomcat
or Jetty because JBoss doesn't really support supplemental directories
or even proper relocation of its main directories.
Cargo also starts the full JBoss AS5 server which also takes a while to
startup.
I can take a look and break down what is taking the most time.

If we want Cargo to start a lot faster, its going to mean making JBoss
support supplemental directories (ie multiple deploy directories,
multiple deployers directories, etc...) and figuring out a simple JBoss
configuration that starts faster.

A light weight embedded JBoss might be a good option. But people are
going to want to have all the same functionality as normal JBoss, which
is going to make it just as slow.