This is certainly a valid approach IMO and one that I have used for years. EasyMock and JMock are great frameworks that make this easy to do and you can always write stubs (which it sounds like you were already considering). I always strive to make my components testable outside a container as it generally leads to loosely coupled components. View the original post : http://www.jboss.com/index.html?module=bb&op=viewtopic&p=4090685#... Reply to the post : http://www.jboss.com/index.html?module=bb&op=posting&mode=reply&a...