Not impressed

[jrumskas]

After hearing the praises about Jboss for weeks now, the award winning EJB app server from a lot of outside contractors recently joining my development group I decided that I would spend the weekend checking it out and run some very simple examples. Then I could go back to work on Monday and do a presentation to my management team on the virtue of moving our applications to the EJB architecture and using Jboss as the EJB applications server. After downloading and installing all of the software, I attempted to deploy and run the examples posted on the web site for the correct version of JBoss that I was using. No luck. Ok I will put together a simple EJB hello world example from one of the many sources out there and, being that the beauty of EJB is that it is platform independent :) and language independent :) it should run if I drop it into my deply folder. Nope. Ok, I will get EJB examples from the Sun web site and run it in JBoss. Nope. Ok after 16 hours of iterations with hello world ebj my report is this: until JBoss has some consistency in its documentation AND between the versions of its app servers Jboss is really nothing more than another lame freeware attempt at free software that would introduce a host of unknowns into any stable development-deployment environment.

[jrumskas]

Oh, by the way. After I gave up on the JBoss docs I checked out:
http://java.sun.com/j2ee/download.html#tutorial
and had a simple web based EJB up and running in 20 minutes.

[vashistvishal]

You might want to check this and I am sure will change yr opinion.

www.tusc.com.au/tutorial/index.html

Goodluck....

[celias]

I checked out your url and it I get a 404 error.

[ejbnewbie]

you might want to check out this thread too

-ejbnewbie

[ejbnewbie]

oops forgot the actual link :">

http://www.jboss.org/modules/bb/index.html?module=bb&op=viewtopic&t=

[vashistvishal]

Opps .. i posted wrong link.

www.tusc.com.au./tutorial/html/index.html.

[glyn_walters]

I have to say I'm not impressed with the documentation either. It's orientated around one way of doing things i.e load the other associated open source tools and build a project in the prescribed style. There is very little clear instruction I could ascertain about how to deploy EJBs written through other means. Plus I'm having to currently stop all my existing Tomcat services because I can't use my existing apache installation. Or if I can again it's not clear from the documentation how to do it.

[bruciadmin]

C'mon people, chin up!!

Doesn't anyone remember the issues we all had when we all first learnt whatever was the first app server we came to? God knows apache isn't always the most forgiving thing in the world? Then, if you want real pain, has anyone ever tried doing anything interesting interesting with Oracle's httpd (Apache) server? That over inflated beast caused me no end of grief. Tomcat again, it took time to get to know the quirks though once through it is always worth it. Just on Monday I had to install a "demo" laptop with our Oracle app along with both the standard Apache running and also Tomcat. Nowhere does Oracle advertise that it has introduced a new "service" for XML Database B-something-or-other (XDB) which also listens on the same default port for Tomcat (8080).

I'm not saying this app is faultless but surely anyone in this industry should expect the worst and hope for the best? I've only just (as of Tuesday) begun learning this app and I can see a heap of areas which are going to hurt my head, but like all the other things i am forced to learn, knowing this stuff well gives u real respect.

And if that wasn't enough to get you re-enthused, how bout i just call u all quitters;-)

Dave

[pcb]

This doc also sucks, it's completely IDE oriented and only works if you are working on the same machine where you installed JBoss, how else are they to expect the startDatabaseManager() MBean call to show up anything? I have JBoss running on a console only linux box (X is not a requirement for JBoss) and the manager is an applet... BUM!

[juhalindfors]

In conclusion, all docs suck. Who wants to volunteer to write yet another doco that sucks?

-- Juha

[vashistvishal]

I can do this but, I need more time to go throgh Jboss. I dont know how much time is required for documntationa nd how to go in this direction.
If you can specify waht are the expectations and whats the scope of docs and what versions of Jboss are we targettting then I will be in far better shape to to do some work and after all this, how do we coordiantae and other issues.

Let me know.
Cheers.....
Vishal.

[brian.harkness]

RE: All docs suck. I Can't say I agree with you on this one. Very many application servers at the very least have clear documentation of how to install the server.

It took me a mere 20 minutes to install Oracle Application server on 1st attempt.

Borland Enterprise Server did not even require a manual and insatlled 1st attemp complete with one example and loaded into the web browser just in case I missed it.

See the contrast?

I would be more than happy to pay for support had I the feeling the the calibre would be significantly higher.

[juha]

> It took me a mere 20 minutes to install Oracle
> Application server on 1st attempt.
>
> Borland Enterprise Server did not even require a
> manual and insatlled 1st attemp complete with one
> example and loaded into the web browser just in case
> I missed it.
>
> See the contrast?

No I don't see the contrast. Your examples do not make sense as it only requires you to unzip the JBoss bundle to 'install' it -- maybe 30 seconds.

The bookstores are full of dead trees explaining how to write and package J2EE applications. As long as you follow the J2EE spec, your package will deploy and run on JBoss.

If your complaint is that our documentation does not teach you J2EE then that is true -- but then that has never been it's intended purpose either.

The 'Getting Started' documentation for 3.0 was a mistake, pretend it never existed. If you want to get started buy the RMH EJB book and the accompanying workbook for JBoss to go with it.


-- Juha




>
> I would be more than happy to pay for support had I
> the feeling the the calibre would be significantly
> higher.