free servlet directory gateway w/ tomcat installation instructions

[Jon Roberts <jo...@mentata.com>]

I am an independent software developer and consultant. Last fall I 
released a free and open source software product that I think some may 
be interested in. You can find out all about it at:

http://www.mentata.com/ldaphttp/

My central offering is a framework for building efficient MVC web 
applications using web servers, directory servers, and Java servlets. I 
deliver with it a directory gateway application that enables users to 
retrieve, create, delete, extend, update, and link entries in directory 
databases through web interfaces. It was developed in a contractual 
engagement and is currently being used in a high-vis production capacity 
within an mid-size enterprise. I intend to add some key capabilities in 
the coming year, and will launch subscription web services of my own 
design sometime afterwards.

I have now reconfigured the delivered software to be installed with a 
.war file, and have included specific notes for Tomcat installation. You 
can find this (and some commentary which *may* be of interest to you) at:

http://www.mentata.com/news/28Feb03.htm

I request your feedback on these installation instructions. In 
particular, I want to make sure there is not a community or technical 
reason for aversion to putting packaged software in the 
[CATALINA_HOME]/shared/lib directory.

Most of my previous servlet engine experience has been with the 
Netscape/iPlanet/Sun ONE family of web servers. However, in the interest 
of open source I have migrated my development environment to 
Apache/Tomcat to complement Linux and OpenLDAP. FWIW, I so far find 
Tomcat to be superior in capability and support to the Sun offering, but 
with some shortcomings in stability and complexity both with the 
application itself and with the (still evolving) space of connectors. I 
am committed to the approach overall, and will provide feedback and 
support when possible. Thank you for any interest and feedback, and 
please keep up the great work.

Jon Roberts
jon@mentata.com


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Re: free servlet directory gateway w/ tomcat installation instructions

[Jon Roberts <jo...@mentata.com>]

Jacob Kjome wrote:
> Why do you recommend putting the two required jar files ( ldaphttp.jar 
> and ldapjdk.jar ) in CATALINA_HOME/shared/lib?  Why not just add a 
> WEB-INF/lib directory to your .war archive and put the jars in there.  
> It makes for much simpler deployment and fewer instructions.

I want to make it easy to deploy multiple .war files of servlets (read: 
applications) that all use these libraries. Also, if you put them in the 
.war, you can't put the examples in CATALINA_HOME/shared/lib because 
they would extend classes that would then be "hidden" in the .war. Then 
you'd have to extract and modify files inside the .war to get it to work 
or make modifications to your local definitions.

> Also, why not have a default working example already set up and ready to 
> go?  As it stands, the .war file you have isn't deployable without some 
> additional work.  Why not just set it up so that it works by simply 
> dropping it in CATALNIA_HOME/webapps and something can actually be 
> viewed by default?  It would make it more clear how things are supposed 
> to work.

The problem is that any example would require the knowledge of the 
associated directory server. Directory servers have few limitations on 
how they are configured, so no set of defaults would cover everybody and 
I don't want to provide an example that only works out of the box for a 
percentage of people. I could assume internet connectivity and use a 
public internet server, but I don't currently administer one myself and 
would consider it inappropriate to reference somebody else's.

This isn't ideal, and that's why I absolutely want to hear what's 
impalatable. However, I am kind of interested in creating something that 
nudges people to set up and use the javac and jar commands. It promotes 
awareness and administrative self-sufficiency for Java in general.

> Just my $0.02

And thanks for it. It's worth more than that to me, but I don't support 
micropayments so you'll have to content yourself with my gratitude :)

Jon Roberts
www.mentata.com


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Re: free servlet directory gateway w/ tomcat installation instructions

[Jacob Kjome <ho...@visi.com>]

Why do you recommend putting the two required jar files ( ldaphttp.jar and 
ldapjdk.jar ) in CATALINA_HOME/shared/lib?  Why not just add a WEB-INF/lib 
directory to your .war archive and put the jars in there.  It makes for 
much simpler deployment and fewer instructions.

Also, why not have a default working example already set up and ready to 
go?  As it stands, the .war file you have isn't deployable without some 
additional work.  Why not just set it up so that it works by simply 
dropping it in CATALNIA_HOME/webapps and something can actually be viewed 
by default?  It would make it more clear how things are supposed to work.

Just my $0.02

Jake

At 10:37 AM 3/1/2003 -0600, you wrote:
>I am an independent software developer and consultant. Last fall I 
>released a free and open source software product that I think some may be 
>interested in. You can find out all about it at:
>
>http://www.mentata.com/ldaphttp/
>
>My central offering is a framework for building efficient MVC web 
>applications using web servers, directory servers, and Java servlets. I 
>deliver with it a directory gateway application that enables users to 
>retrieve, create, delete, extend, update, and link entries in directory 
>databases through web interfaces. It was developed in a contractual 
>engagement and is currently being used in a high-vis production capacity 
>within an mid-size enterprise. I intend to add some key capabilities in 
>the coming year, and will launch subscription web services of my own 
>design sometime afterwards.
>
>I have now reconfigured the delivered software to be installed with a .war 
>file, and have included specific notes for Tomcat installation. You can 
>find this (and some commentary which *may* be of interest to you) at:
>
>http://www.mentata.com/news/28Feb03.htm
>
>I request your feedback on these installation instructions. In particular, 
>I want to make sure there is not a community or technical reason for 
>aversion to putting packaged software in the [CATALINA_HOME]/shared/lib 
>directory.
>
>Most of my previous servlet engine experience has been with the 
>Netscape/iPlanet/Sun ONE family of web servers. However, in the interest 
>of open source I have migrated my development environment to Apache/Tomcat 
>to complement Linux and OpenLDAP. FWIW, I so far find Tomcat to be 
>superior in capability and support to the Sun offering, but with some 
>shortcomings in stability and complexity both with the application itself 
>and with the (still evolving) space of connectors. I am committed to the 
>approach overall, and will provide feedback and support when possible. 
>Thank you for any interest and feedback, and please keep up the great work.
>
>Jon Roberts
>jon@mentata.com
>
>
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>To unsubscribe, e-mail: tomcat-user-unsubscribe@jakarta.apache.org
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