1. WebSphere & EJB’s Experiences, Deployment & Best Practices
Brian Mitchell
Chief Technical Architect

2. WebSphere EJB Tips
Pay attention to supported release and maintenance levels of EVERYTHING
Learn how to run the trace facility, and how to monitor the logs
Learn when, and when not to use EJB’s
Would only recommend version ’s EJB support
Don’t hard-code dependencies, and dependant paths
Use property files, XML configuration files, and/or Java resource bundles
Watch for differences between WAS and VAJ
Watch case sensitivity (Unix versus Non-Unix)

3. The CLASSPATH
Learning how the CLASSPATH in WebSphere works will probably reduce 50% of your deployment problems
Constructed Using
Used By
-classpath JVM argument + CLASSPATH property in admin.config
Primordial ClassLoader
 EJB --
Node dependent classpath + all the application container's deployed EJB JARs
 Servlet/JSP --
JAR ClassLoader
Each classpath defined to the Web Application
Power ClassLoader (a.k.a. Servlet ClassLoader)

4. WebSphere EJB Developer Tips
Understand Java Threading
Isolation Level/Transaction Attributes – Don’t Ignore these
Understand how to apply them to your EJB’s
Don’t just accept the defaults
Problem Determination
Use a logging facility
Consider “catching” and logging unchecked Java exceptions (java.lang.RuntimeException)
WebSphere will loose the exception context when it throws a RemoteException

5. Summary: WebSphere & EJB
Use WebSphere for EJB’s
WebSphere has improved dramatically over the past year:
EJB Support
Documentation (online and PDF’s)
WebSphere still has a way to go with:
Useful error messages
A good performing administrative environment
Persistence (EJB Entity Bean Support)
A “WebSphere Aware” Distributed Debugger