The GlassFish Update Center is an open-source project released with GlassFish v2. It provides a simple download and installation experience of additional
applications for the GlassFish application server.
GlassFish v3 is not just modular but the components can be updated through IPS-based UpdateCenter machinery.
The Update Center team has been evolving tracking the IPS changes and adding refinements of their own;
newer releases, like
GFv3Preview ,
have been running recent UC, but the repositories for
GFv3Prelude
were running an older version of UC.
Last week the Glassfish team pushed
Update Center Toolkit 2.2u2
to the Prelude repositories.
In normal conditions you should not notice the change but if you visit the
repository directly
you will see new graphics and
additional facilities (like package search) plus improved performance and metrics.
GFv3 FCS is around the corner and we are seeing very high interest in the release.
At that point we expect the bulk of the GlassFish downloads to switch to being served from the
IPS repositories - and we will find out if our capacity planning has been accurate :-)
It took a bit longer than anticipated, but we have updated the repositories
behind GlassFish v3 Preview
(STABLE from glassfish.sun.com).
You are most likely to notice this through the
see
new SoftwareUpdate tool ,
but you might also see it through the GUI UpdateTool
or the embedded UpdateTool,
or do it manually via the CLI.
Jeff ' s blog entry on installing Web Stack using IPS (a new feature in 1.5) now has a screencast version (4 min. ogg format, use Firefox 3.5 or VLC 1.0), courtesy of Brian . The GlassFish Web Stack (see recent 1.5 release ) uses the same packaging technology as the GlassFish App Server and as OpenSolaris (where the technology initially came from).
IPS, also known as pkg(5), offers a packaging system and tools (both command-line and graphical) to install and manage images. Check the IPS tag for more coverage (mainly applied to GlassFish AS).
Earlier in the week Brian had also posted a detailed entry on how to setup Django using WebStack on Solaris, together with a screencast (also in .ogg format). This one uses the " native" Python implementation and the Apache web server. For details on how to run Django with Jython on GlassFish, visit Vivek ' s blog which has al l the details for you (the GlassFish v3 update center now has a jython container available as an add-on).
We have been converting our distributions to leverage the new
IPS format .
Recent conversions to IPS include
OpenMQ 4.4
and some distributions of
GFv2.1
but the distribution with the largest volume remains
GFv3 Preview .
The SoftwareUpdate tool provides a simplified interface to the standard
UpdateTool, normally activated via a
PopUp Notice .
A single click
Starts a Search
for all the Apps that can be updated.
Once Completed ,
choose the Apps you want to update, accept the license terms, and install.
The SoftwareUpdate tool will report on the progress of the install:
[ 1 ] ,
[ 2 ] ,
[ 3 ] .
Once
Completed
you are done.
The underlying machinery is the same used in the UpdateTool,
and you can peek into the details, both before installing and after installing,
but the SoftwareUpdate experience is faster and simpler,
and more appropriate for most users.
IPS is one of the key new technologies that we are leveraging for
GlassFish v3 ;
related entries are
tagged IPS .
If you want more technical details, Christophe has a very good
Presentation
as part of the
IPS Best Practices
wiki.
Also check the
UC2 Blogs .
Jersey 1.1.1-ea
(see
Announcement )
is now available at the GlassFish.org DEV Update Center repository.
This means you can update your GlassFish to this development
module with a couple of clicks.
Follow the same instructions as for the latest Mojarra/JSF to
discover and install the module;
see our
previous post
for details.
The Update Center technology and repositories leverage
IPS
and GFv3 ' s modularity (built on
OSGi )
to make updates, upgrades and additions very easy.
The technology supports multiple repositories, local, intra-net, or remote
and can be used not just to deliver updates to GlassFish but
also all sorts of functionality on it, from Sun, its partners, your partners, your group, your IT shop, etc...
This is a significant change to the way we currently address these tasks and
we are still improving all the pieces of this chain.
I ' m considering organizing a couple of online webinars on the topic later in the summer
to get more details out but also to get your feedback and do some additional brainstorming.
