Avalon Phoenix 4.0a2 Released

[Peter Donald <do...@apache.org>]

Avalon Phoenix 4.0a2 Released
-----------------------------
 The Avalon team is proud to announce the 4.0a2 alpha
 release of Avalon Phoenix.

About Avalon
------------
 The Avalon project is Apache's Java Server Framework.
 It is separated into five sub projects: Framework,
 Excalibur, LogKit, Cornerstone, and Phoenix. Its
 purpose is to simplify server side programming for
 Java based projects. It formalizes serveral best
 of breed practices and patterns for server side programming.

For more information about Avalon, please go to
http://jakarta.apache.org/avalon

About Avalon Phoenix 4.0a2
--------------------------
 Avalon Phoenix is a micro-kernel designed and implemented
 on top of the Avalon Framework. It is both an API to
 program to and a reference implementation. The reference
 implementation provides a number of facilities
 to manage the environment of Server Applications.
 Such facilities include log management, classloading,
 thread management and security. In the future it
 will conditionally offer support extra facilities
 such as central server management, server pools,
 and other facilities aimed at reducing the time to
 market. The API defines a standard method of piecing
 togther server components and creating a server.

 In order to see Avalon Phoenix at work, you should
 grab the example applications or servers that are
 included in Avalon Cornerstone. Apache James 
(http://jakarta.apache.org/james/)
 uses Phoenix for it's mail server.


For more information about Avalon Phoenix 4.0a2, please go to
http://jakarta.apache.org/avalon/phoenix

ChangeLog for Avalon Phoenix 4.0a2

*)  Update Phoenix to use the new Avalon Framework Logger
 interface rather than directly using LogKits Logger
 class. This required a backwards incompatible change
 in BlockContext. The getLogger() methods now return
 the Logger interface rather than LogKits Logger
 class. If a Block implements Loggable then it will
 be passed LogKits Logger, this is required for backwards
 compatability. If the Block implements LogEnabled
 it will receive the new style Logger. [PD]

*)  Add support for undeploying and unistalling applications.
 Add support for separating out install phase from
 deployment phase and persisting information about
 application installations. [MT]

*)  Rework the application deployment format (ie .sar
 format) to be more in line with other specifications.
 See docs/creating-a-server-application.html
 in distribution for current format description.
 The old format is deprecated but will still work. [PD]

*)  Created the start of a Phoenix Developers Kit (PDK)
 that will enable developers to rapidly become accustom
 to developing Phoenix applications. [PH]

*)  Started to incorporate the JMX code more fully into
 Phoenix kernel. Started doing this by refactoring
 the base MBeans and testing using the RIs agent. [PD]

*)  Separated code that validated assembly of application
 into separate classes. The validation is now much
 stricter and requires that Blocks conform to established
 patterns. The validation phase should give more
 reasonable explanations for violations. Extra
 validation checks include verifying that services
 offered by a Block are actually interfaces, that
 there is no circular dependencies, that declared
 Blocks and BlockListeners actually implement Block
 or BlockListener interface, that the names of Blocks
 are valid etc. [PD]


Downloads for Avalon Phoenix 4.0a2 available at 

http://jakarta.apache.org/builds/jakarta-avalon/release/phoenix/latest
    
-- 
Cheers,

Pete

-------------------------------------------------------
"When we remember we are all mad, the mysteries of life 
disappear and life stands explained." -Mark Twain
-------------------------------------------------------


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