1 2 Previous Next 21 Replies Latest reply on Oct 22, 2004 6:57 PM by belaban

    JBossCache in production

    belaban

      Anybody using JBossCache in production, staging or a larger project ? I realize that the product hasn't been out long yet, but maybe there are some projects that would like to report on where/what they're using JBossCache for.

      If yes, would you be willing to share your story with us ?

      Cheers,

      Bela

        • 1. Re: JBossCache in production
          norbert

          I'm going to use JBossCache as a distributed cache in an set of J2EE-applications for 80000 registered Users / 20000 per Day to share per-user-sessiondata across different JSP/EJB-applications which reside on different BEA-6.1-Clusters. The applications are allready productive and currenty using a per-VM-cache I wrote myself. (Which results in a much higher access-rate to the backend database than a distributed cache would allow to archive).

          Given no mayer bugs will delay implementation I plan to go productive at the end of august

          • 2. Re: JBossCache in production
            aubergine

            We're more than likely going to use the cache for a range of small AOP apps for SMEs - not too sure how far we are from deployment as this all depends on when the refactoring will happen for JBoss Cache as we need a 'remoting' type layer. Once the refacting has happened then we should be a month away from deployment. Will elaborate more once we get there!

            Neat project.

            • 3. Re: JBossCache in production
              chucklan

              We have implemented a high score cluster using the jgroups stack at shockwave.com. Serving requests for hundreds of games. It's been up for over a week, and so far all's well!

              Without going too much into details, we're using the distributed cache in two places per jvm. One as a local cache, the other as a sort of event broadcaster and hander(TreeCacheListener).


              • 4. Re: JBossCache in production

                Check,

                This is great! Keep it going. :-)

                -Ben

                • 5. Re: JBossCache in production
                  dres1011

                  I cannot go into many details but we just started to use jbosscache with hibernate. If all goes well we will be going live in 2 weeks.

                  Is there anything anybody can tell me to watch for using this as hibernate's 2nd tier cache?

                  In particular,

                  - anything I need to know to get the query cache to work?
                  - can we turn off replication and just use clustered invalidation?

                  I can tell you we will probably be the largest single site install if we are able to get this thing working the way we want. I am a bit concerned about the performance of cache replication under heavy load. I will give more details about our experience and usage when I am able.

                  Thanks for providing a great product.

                  • 6. Re: JBossCache in production
                    chucklan

                    it's been 50 days since launch, and so far no memory leaks or whatsoever. good product!

                    • 7. Re: JBossCache in production
                      darthjoe

                      I develop software for a medium sized ecommerce site.
                      We are currently running jboss 3.2.3 with treecache 1.01 and hybernate 2.1
                      Treecache is in local mode with jboss invalidation bridge for cache invalidation

                      Our experiences with treecache have not been great so far.

                      The first problem occurred during our beta launch when we were running treecache 1.0. The servers completely locked up, under fairly low load. Treecache 1.01 reportedly
                      fixed this issue.

                      The big problem in moving to treecache 1.01 was that it was not available
                      for our version of jboss. Treecache 1.01 relied on a newer version of jgroups which
                      was not available on our version of jboss. Jgroups had removed classes from the release instead of deprecating them. We created a frankenstein version of jgroups
                      and deployed the 1.01 version of treecache.

                      We currently believe we are experiencing this bug
                      http://www.jboss.org/index.html?module=bb&op=viewtopic&t=51539
                      It looks like it may be fixed in 1.02. We haven't verified that it will work with our
                      version of jboss and jgroups.

                      Version 1.1 of treecache would be the logical next step. Unfortunately 1.1 has
                      only been back ported to jboss 3.2.6. the first issue is that 3.2.6 is not officially released. The second issue is that 3.2.6 while a point release, is not a minor release. Major revisions have been made. Specifically, since 3.2.5, the mbean config files have changed for some of the services and the supported tomcat distro moved from 4 to 5.

                      Before I get flamed, I'd like to say that I do appreciate all the hard work that has gone into both jboss and treecache. This is my first experience with using an open source app
                      server in a production environment. I've worked with weblogic before and we were
                      using version 4.5.1 service pack 4-16 for years, so its been a frustrating experience to be forced to do major upgrades in order to get simple fixes. We are looking at dedicating a resource to be involved in the community and hopefully address these issues.

                      -Joe


                      • 8. Re: JBossCache in production
                        belaban

                        Hi Joe,

                        we are listening and take your suggestions and comments seriously.

                        I think the biggest problem for you was patch/release management. When we release, we strive to provide releases for JBoss head, the 4.x and the 3.2.x branch. We don't backport to older (released versions), as this would create too much work, and we would simply drown in backporting work, rather than improving the actual code.

                        However, on the bright side, we strive for max independence from JBoss, so that you can take any version of JBossCache in the future and use it with any 3.2.x and 4.x version of JBoss.
                        The dependencies so far are
                        - JMX (minor, doesn't change much)
                        - JGroups (hmm) and
                        - JBossAop (somewhat a moving target right now).

                        Hope this helps and please keep the suggestions coming !

                        Bela

                        • 9. Re: JBossCache in production
                          darthjoe

                          Hi Bela,

                          Thanks for the response. What I would like to see is higher priority on released versions of jboss. The current release is 3.2.5 but it seems virtually abandoned.

                          There is currently a major bug in the jboss jdbc connection pool. The fix is only available in the 3.2.6 cvs tree. The fixes to the jboss cache are also only available to the 3.2.6 cvs tree. We would have liked to see these fixes
                          placed into a 3.2.5.x release as emergency patches.

                          As a professional customer, there are no optimal solutions right now. The only options are to either give up, replace major components, or deploy a non release version of jboss into a production environment.

                          We are opting for the latter solution. We don't want to give up on jboss. We've invested a lot of time in building our service around it.

                          We have not contributed back to the community. We have not donated funds or time. We understand we don't deserve these changes, and we
                          have no right to demand them.

                          Regardless of deserve, if the goal of the jboss group is to provide the leading application server and gain corporate customers, then it must acknowledge these issues.

                          We are planning to be more vocal in the community, and contribute what we can with our resources.

                          Thank you for listening,

                          -Joe

                          • 10. Re: JBossCache in production
                            belaban

                             

                            "darthjoe" wrote:
                            Hi Bela,

                            Thanks for the response. What I would like to see is higher priority on released versions of jboss. The current release is 3.2.5 but it seems virtually abandoned.

                            There is currently a major bug in the jboss jdbc connection pool. The fix is only available in the 3.2.6 cvs tree. The fixes to the jboss cache are also only available to the 3.2.6 cvs tree. We would have liked to see these fixes
                            placed into a 3.2.5.x release as emergency patches.


                            We currently do this only for (paying) customers who request a backport to a specific version. Otherwise we end up having to backport to at least 4 versions on 2 different branches, which is a nightmare.
                            If there is a big bug, we try to schedule a release as soon as possible, but we don't usually backport to earlier releases; we'd also have to create a branch off of that release and patch it. Again, we do this just for paying customers.


                            As a professional customer, there are no optimal solutions right now.


                            I have to disagree. As a professional (a.k.a paying customer) you do get specific backports.


                            We are opting for the latter solution. We don't want to give up on jboss. We've invested a lot of time in building our service around it.

                            We have not contributed back to the community. We have not donated funds or time. We understand we don't deserve these changes, and we have no right to demand them.

                            Regardless of deserve, if the goal of the jboss group is to provide the leading application server and gain corporate customers, then it must acknowledge these issues.

                            We are planning to be more vocal in the community, and contribute what we can with our resources.

                            -Joe


                            Looking forward to it - we will all benefit.
                            Regards,

                            Bela


                            • 11. Re: JBossCache in production
                              starksm64

                               


                              Thanks for the response. What I would like to see is higher priority on released versions of jboss. The current release is 3.2.5 but it seems virtually abandoned.

                              There is currently a major bug in the jboss jdbc connection pool. The fix is only available in the 3.2.6 cvs tree. The fixes to the jboss cache are also only available to the 3.2.6 cvs tree. We would have liked to see these fixes placed into a 3.2.5.x release as emergency patches.


                              What do you think the jboss-3.2.6RC1, jboss-3.2.6RC2 and jboss-3.2.6 todo tasks are about? If you want arbitary fixes backported, get a support contract. Otherwise contribute to the next release stability testing to speed it along.


                              • 12. Re: JBossCache in production
                                frogman

                                How quickly this thread turned into a push for services.

                                I thank Joe for explaining his problems with the product. A working JDBC connection pool and cache are basic functionality in an application server.

                                I've heard and read so many good things about JBoss and have been monitoring the boards for a while now (and using the product). Having an executive from the company calling major functionality "arbitrary" is a cause for concern. Suggesting using release candidates in a production environment is another cause for concern. It shows a lack of understanding in a release process and the needed stability in a production environment.

                                How would paying for a support contract help that?

                                • 13. Re: JBossCache in production

                                  You must know it takes a lot of effort to deliver a patch. And that is the resources many times that we can't afford unless it is critical (wtiness 3.2.4 to 3.2.5).

                                  I don't think we are pushing services at all cost. But services is our bread and butter. Product is free. Like Bela mentioned, we are simply making a value proposition to benifit all of us.

                                  Bottom line is you are always welcome to contribute the patch as well.

                                  -Ben

                                  • 14. Re: JBossCache in production
                                    starksm64

                                    Arbitrary refers to the demand to patch x in timeframe y. I'm currently working on finalizing the 3.2.6 release which includes the pooling fix along with others and do not have the time for arbitrary time demands from non-support customers. If a support customer needs the feature now they will get it now. If you want to test the bug fix and create a patch I can look at releasing it in the junit test pauses. Otherwise the imminent 3.2.6 solves the problem.

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