Ajit Sagar

Welcome back to the Cosmic Cup. I hope you are enjoying our voyage through the Java universe. Last month we examined the APIs that are formally defined under the scope of the Java Platform for the Enterprise. We're going to change the course of our journey a bit. This month we will look at the APIs that define the Java Platform itself. What is the Java Platform? Before getting deeper into the discussion, I would like to comment on the terms "Java Platform" and the "Java Enterprise." The Java Platform is defined as "a new operating environment for delivering and running highly interactive, dynamic, distributed and secure applications on network computers." It is a layer on top of existing operating systems and hardware platforms that enables the compilation of software programs to bytecodes, which are machine instructions for a virtual machine contained in the Java ... (more)

Splitting Tiers

The story about how the n-tier architectures evolved from the single-tier mainframe model has probably been told umpteen times by now (in fact, I retold it myself in last month's e-Java column). Nowadays the trend is to distribute functionality. Modularize everything. Components provide the means to successfully replicate your product in a gazillion scenarios. Client/server is old news. Think distributed architectures. Personalized Webtops. That's the name of the game today. It's easy to get caught up in the hype and lose touch with reality. The Internet fosters a new type of dy... (more)

The Commerce in Java Application Servers

Before we start on the technical front, let me tell you about my latest acquisition. I recently went out to purchase a watch. My wife wanted me to buy one of the fancy ones, but I'm more excited by watches that have all the features ­ stopwatch, backlight, barometer, altimeter, everymeter ­ and the time displayed in BOLD DIGITAL NUMBERS. I usually end up using maybe three out of a hundred features, but at least I have them. But I digress. I thought about where I could get the watch. The amazing thing is that you can buy them in nearly every kind of store ­ superstore, sports sto... (more)

Serving Business Applications

In the world of distributed computing, the industry has latched on to another snazzy, buzzword-compliant, omnipotent entity, the Application Server, also known affectionately as the App Server. Here's the sales pitch. You want a robust system? Fault tolerance? Load balancing? Multithreaded transaction support? Well, don't reinvent the wheel. If you're developing an application that solves a particular business problem, concentrate on solving that problem and on developing that application. Don't waste precious resources trying to focus on solving a problem that's outside your are... (more)

Global XML

I spent most of last week helping our company host one of our Japanese partners for business and technology discussions. Part of my responsibility as an architect is to help figure out how our architecture and product line can be used in different scenarios. To do this for a company halfway 'round the globe, extremely long words with the funny alphanumeric acronyms suddenly become very important. I am, of course, talking about I18N (internationalization) and L10N (localization). I'm sure most of you know how those acronyms were formed. The number in the acronym is related to the ... (more)