A welcome consequence of working in open-source is that we’re tightly wound into the user feedback loop; over time the shortcomings of our projects and industry echo repeatedly and steer our direction.
It’s become very clear to us on the Arquillian team that users aren’t really seeking a component-by-component approach to building applications. While docs on EJB and Seam are all well and good, they’re instructive of a particular technology. And users don’t primarily aim to learn APIs, they want to solve problems.
- How do I bootstrap my application tests with data?
- What’s a good approach to handling server-push events?
- Where is the best place to keep my logged-in user’s state?
- When is it appropriate to leverage a distributed data grid?
- Why would I opt for a NoSQL solution in place of a relational model?
For a long time now we’ve debated undertaking an “Arquillian Book” to showcase our beloved test platform. But as the idea to author a text evolved, our own advice increased in relevance:
Testing is development.
Arquillian isn’t really the focus; it’s just a tool. And under the JBoss umbrella, we have a veritable armada of projects suited to ease, extend, and enhance Enterprise Java.
What’s been lacking is a illustrative source to address how these disparate bits work in tandem, and more importantly, when they should be applied.
So I’m proud to announce that Dan Allen, Aslak Knutsen and I will be delivering a guide to some of the most common and interesting use-cases in building multiuser applications. It’s aptly entitled: “Continuous Enterprise Development in Java“.
The book is currently on-target for an Early-Access Program, presales, and some initial material to be available around the JavaOne 2012 timeframe, with formal release following in the Spring of 2013.
We’ve enlisted the editorial expertise of O’Reilly Media, and in particular Meghan Blanchette to assist with quality assurance, translations, electronic media, and worldwide distribution.
The decision to go with O’Reilly was two-fold.
- Trust. Meghan made it clear that she’d mediate on our behalf to address some rather non-traditional requests for the authoring and publication process.
- O’Reilly catered to our needs and enabled us with the open process we’d been hoping for.
At a time when half the world has gone mad over intellectual property and copyrights in a vain effort to “protect” their work, Tim O’Reilly has advocated for the “free flow of information“. As developers of free software, we agree and will be authoring the book’s source content under the Creative Commons Sharealike License.
This enables us to hook into a complementary effort already underway at JBoss: The JBoss Way.
Put simply, the JBoss Way is an approach to building Java EE applications using the JBoss stack. It’s backed by a series of quickstart examples and tutorials branded as the JBoss Developer Framework.
The JDF team has been doing some great work that’s available NOW to use/view/fork. The TicketMonster example is already running on the OpenShift cloud.
So Dan, Aslak and I are very, very excited to pursue this open approach to publishing along with our friends in the Java EE Community, for the Java EE Community.
S,
ALR
