RE: Re: Re: EAR/WAR Deployment

Joe,

As usual, I disagree with you on this issue.

First, the WebSphere documentation is simply trying to explain the default 
location where WebSphere will install applications.  It is trying to 
explain it in a platforn independent way since these docs apply to all of 
the WebSphere platforms which use very different file system structures. 
When you install an application in WebSphere you are free to install it to 
your own root location.  There is some forced structure below that, but I 
just do not find that the hard-ship that you do.

I wish that WAS Express did not carry with it the extra things like nodes 
and cells that are only needed in the higher-end versions of WAS, but I 
can certainly understand the budget issues that go into making these 
products and having a single code base is probably worth some of these 
extraneous items being there.

I really liked WAS 3.5 once I learned it and when WAS 4.0 came out I was 
at first upset about the changes, just as I am upset about virtually all 
changes.  Once I learned it, I came to appreciate it, and in my opinion it 
makes installing an application much easier.  In WAS 3.5 having control of 
the CLASSPATH and other settings was great, but it was easy to make 
mistakes.  If you just had one server you controlled, then the flexibility 
was worth it.  If you are someone that is providing applications for other 
people to install, as is my situation, then WAS 4.0 + is much better 
because the user cannot make a mistake.  My EAR/WAR file has everything in 
the right location and the application automatically installs itself 
perfectly every time - regardless of the platform.  In fact, it doesn't 
even have to be WebSphere.

I believe that a lot of these benefits could only be provided by using a 
handful of magic filenames, like application.xml and web.xml and magic 
folders like ./WEB-INF/classes and ./WEB-INF/lib.  Could those magic names 
have been better?  Probably.  Who cares?  You learn it and move on.

I do not think this is drastically different then install a normal OS/400 
application and it is certainly much easier than installing a Windows 
application.

Mark