New JMX code in 1.2 alpha

[Mark Masterson <ma...@compuserve.com>]

Hi Ceki,

Since I was on a quest to find a way to append to an SNMP trap last week, I
spent some time researching the upcoming JMX API from Sun.  I had high hopes
that I would be able to use this to allow me to create an open,
vendor-neutral implementation of an SNMP trap sender.  However, my research
convinced me that JMX was not useful to me at this time.  Given what I
learned about it, therefore, I was surprised to see you mention that you are
building support for configuration via JMX into the 1.2 alpha.  I went and
looked at the code in the new "jmx" package on the CVS server, and found
that not only were you using the JMX API, but also the JDMK.  You've
implemented it using the "com.sun.jdmk.comm..HtmlAdaptorServer" as the
remote interface to address JMX.

I have some questions about this.  First, is using the JDMK a good idea?
For those who don't know, the JMX API is (at the moment) just a spec with a
reference implementation.  In particular, it doesn't provide implementations
of exactly the thing one needs the most - an interface to the outside world.
In JMX-speak, this would be a "communications adaptor or connector".  The
spec makes references to several potential adaptors, most notably, one for
HTTP access to the resources managed by JMX, and one for SNMP (hence my
initial interest.).  However, no adaptors have currently been implemented as
part of the base JMX package (and maybe they never will be).  Sun does,
however, have implementations - these, among other things, are what one gets
with the JDMK - in effect, the JDMK is (again, among other things) an
implementation of the JMX API.

The reason for my question is that the JDMK is a commercial product.  One
can download an "evaluation" version, which expires on Nov. 30, 2001.  If
one wants to *use* the JDMK, one must purchase licenses from Sun.  There is
also a commercial version of the JDMK, available on the Sun online store,
which costs $6000 for a single developer license.

Ceki, how does (can?) all this fit into an open source Jakarta project?
Either I'm being really dense, or you're going to have all kinds of problems
trying to distribute this package with the new version.  I would expect it
to make the grief we saw over "which XML parser do I use?" (after the
introduction of the DOMConfigurator) look trivial in comparison.

To be honest, I'm hoping you'll be able to answer me with "No, Mark, look -
there's a trick to it, and it works like this...".  Reason: if there *is*
some way to use the JMX and the JDMK now, reliably, without paying Sun huge
sums, then I want to use it in my SNMPTrapAppender and throw away the
proprietary AdventNet library...  I know the alpha code is not ready for
release, and that certainly gives you the freedom to experiment with
anything you want, but I don't see how you're going to resolve the issue in
the long term.  Are you, perhaps, planning to eventually write your own
version of "HtmlAdaptorServer"?

--Mark


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