Question regarding OpenEJB JTA/XA on osgi

[Yudi Xue <bi...@gmail.com>]

Hi all,

I would like to thank again for your tremendous help on our project by
enabling OpenEJB to run in osgi environment. After we got it working with
eclipse RCP, the project has been progressing quite well and we are seeking
to implement more J2EE features into our project this summer.

The project so far uses a container managed stateless container to
incorporate all Business Logic actions. it uses DAO/JDBC to manage
transactional database connections which can be preconfigured to use either
H2(Local) or MySQL(remote). This architecture has a few drawbacks:

       * we are unable to connect to multiple databases at the same time
(for example work with both remote and local).
       * the scope of transaction is limited at JDBC layer.

Our new requirements are updated to:
       * Configure JTA datasource progmatically at runtime, specifically
from user input
               For most of the time we would like user to specify their own
database connection. I have tried to specify database locations in
properties just like specified in (
http://openejb.apache.org/3.0/testing-transactions-example.html

), but somehow couldn't get it working. I remember osgi handles class path
differently than openejb does, do you mind telling me if it affects the
classpath lookups to database Drivers?

       * Have the freedom to manually specify begin and commit of a
transaction
               This is quite important. It looks like TRANSACTION.MANDATORY
is what we need to have transaction across the business logic and data
access objects. It appears that it is necessary to use JTA/Datasource since
JDBC connection pool will be out of scope for container-based transaction
manager. I am still a bit of confused about how transaction manager works in
openejb, it would be great if you can share your insight.

       * Keep using stateless session bean container
       * Use JTA/XA archaetecture (would be great to have transaction
between databases but it's not mandatory)

I am eager to hear your insights regarding theses issues. Thanks in advance

cheers, yudi