EAR/WAR Deployment

> From: David Gibbs
>
> There are other tools available that are more robust than ANT ...
> but they aren't free.

"Tools"?  As in deployment tools?  Some sort of add-on tool that will deploy
applications?  I don't understand how that would work with WAS.  The only
way I know to deploy to WAS is via an EAR file (or, to a limited degree,
with a WAR file).  There are no other tools, because the WAS folks insist
that they are following the "J2EE standard" and that's all they need to do.

Unfortunately, the more I look into it, the more I realize that J2EE isn't
really standard for business applications.  No concept of net change
deployment, no ability to hot install without bringing down the server, and
now I find that there's no way to run a post-installation script.

As far as I can tell, the J2EE deployment model is pretty much just a way to
occasionally install a tool.  It certainly is no model for business
application deployment.

Joe