Java vs .Net Video :)

Clustering JBoss 5 (porting Weblogic dizzyworld example)

Summary:
If you are coming from the Weblogic world you might have done training and seen the dizzyworld example, i.e. the example environment of at least Weblo 9,10 and 11.
In this post I will try to show some

Main post:


Troubleshooting when starting multiple JBoss instances on one machine (one binded to localhost, the other to your_hostname)
WARN [NAKACK] 55200 discarded message from non-member 55200, my view is ...

Software patents a threat for innovation?

Lately many IT companies have been suing competitors for using their patents. Furthermore patent trolls (companies with the business model of buying patents and suing companies -- congratulations!) have been accreting and have been attacking companies.


Here some references on that:
http://www.networkworld.com/community/node/66807
http://fosspatents.blogspot.com
http://www.slideshare.net/MissionFuture/jan-wildeboer-open-source-presentation
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_and_open_source_software

Howto write JBoss Java MBeans to expose to a JMX Client

Summary:

Sometime you will find yourself in the situation of wanting to monitor your application, but no monitoring capability is given. So you will have to write your own Java MBean that will expose information of your JBoss application to a JMX Client.

Main post:

JBoss documentation

JBoss Wiki

Examples: jboss-eap-4.3_CP08/jboss-as/docs/examples/jmx/logging-monitor

From the JBoss SVN you can get sample MBean classes:

/svn_jboss_org/trunk/varia/src/main/java/org/jboss/jmx/examples/configuration/

Have your MBean interface extend the org.jboss.system.Service and org.jboss.system.ServiceMBean interface.

org.jboss.system.Service and org.jboss.system.ServiceMBean can be found in:  

jboss-eap-4.3_CP08/jboss-as/server/all/deploy/management/console-mgr.sar/web-console.war/applet.jar

Add the classes

The ability to add rich descriptions to attribute and operations

The ability to expose notification information 

The ability to add persistence of attributes

The ability to add custom interceptors for security and remote access through a typed interface

You can see two MBean that are almost the same (up to the fact that one extends the org.jboss.system.ServiceMBean class)

1. 

Attributes: JndiName

Operations: start / stop

2. 

Extents the class org.jboss.system.ServiceMBean -- you can see that this class gives you out of the 

Attributes: Name / JndiName / StateString / State

Operations: destroy / start / stop /create / jbossInternalLifecycle

Notificaitons

Explanation on standard Java MBean like RuntimeMXBean, ThreadMXBean, MemoryPoolMXBean, ... can be found here: http://download.oracle.com/javase/1.5.0/docs/guide/management/overview.html

Jacorb to be found in:
eap43CP08/jboss-as/server/all/lib/jacorb.jar
org.jacorb.util.threadpool.ThreadPool.class (here we have to get the information on the thread pool counter.
In class ThreadPool within method createNewThread() the following line:
localThread.setName(this.namePrefix + this.threadCount++);

Jacorb example:
http://www.jpackage.org/browser/rpm.php?jppversion=6.0&id=7709

Set up environment:
jboss-log4j.xml

Troubleshooting JBoss Portal 4.3

Problems that might occure while working with JBoss Portal:

- Admin link is not visible (between Dashboard and Logout)

That occurs when the admin is not in upper case in the LDAP. See the example of two *.ldif files. One works, the other does not.

Does not work:
dn: cn=admin,ou=Roles,o=rbrackma,dc=redhat,dc=com
objectClass: top
objectClass: groupOfNames
cn: admin
description: Administrators
member: uid=admin,ou=People,o=rbrackma,dc=redhat,dc=com

Works:
dn: cn=Admin,ou=Roles,o=rbrackma,dc=redhat,dc=com
objectClass: top
objectClass: groupOfNames
cn: Admin
description: Administrators
member: uid=admin,ou=People,o=rbrackma,dc=redhat,dc=com

In the EPP logs you might also find another error:


- ERROR [LDAPUserProfileModuleImpl] No such attribute ('title') in entry: uid=admin,ou=People,o=example,dc=jboss,dc=com

LDAP is looking for the attribute title, but does not find it within the RHDS LDAP. Does not cause any problem within the system, but is annoying.

Howto setup LDAP with Red Hat EPP (JBoss Portal / GateIn)

Description:

When you first start with Red Hat's Enterprise Portal Platform you will be able to connect to the portal with admin/admin or user/user. The credentials will be checked against the default users within the portals in-memory database HSQL. Mostly you would want the credentials to be checked against your companies LDAP.

This post will cover setting up an LDAP and configuring EPP4.3 to use it.
- Install LDAP
- Start LDAP services
- Setup LDAP
- Install EPP4.3
- Setup EPP4.3 to use LDAP for credentials

- Connect to the portal http://localhost:8080/portal

Main post:
Install LDAP
Before starting be aware that the only supported LDAP servers are:
Red Hat Directory Server, OpenDS and OpenLDAP.

Within this post the open source LDAP server "Red Hat Directory Server" will be used.

Installing it is pretty straight forward.
First install the software :

sudo yum install 389-ds

sudo yum install fedora-idm-console

Then configure the RHDS with this document:

http://www.scribd.com/doc/20555511/Fedora-Directory-LDAP-Server-Setup-Configuration-on-Linux-HowTo-v1-0
If the document is not available call the following command line and follow the install instructions which are pretty straight forward
# setup-ds-admin.pl

At the End you should remember:
Directory Manager: cn=Directory Manager
Password: your_password
Admin port: 9830
LDAP port: 389

Start LDAP services

sudo service dirsrv start
sudo service dirsrv-admin start
sudo service httpd start

Setup LDAP

Run the earlier installed LDAP browser fedora-idm-console (you can use any other LDAP browser)
$ fedora-idm-console

Choose the Directory Server (1) and choose Open (2).

Then you just have to choose 'Import Databases' and import a *.ldif (save the following text into a test.ldif file). After that you should be able to browse you LDAP tree in the Directory tab...


dn: o=your_host,dc=your_domain,dc=com
objectclass: top
objectclass: dcObject
objectclass: organization
o: your_host
dc: your_host
dn: ou=People,o=your_host,dc=your_domain,dc=com
objectclass: top
objectclass: organizationalUnit
ou: People
dn: uid=admin,ou=People,o=your_host,dc=your_domain,dc=com
objectclass: top
objectclass: inetOrgPerson
objectclass: person
uid: admin
cn: Administrator
sn: Duke
userPassword: admin
mail: admin@your_host.your_domain.com
dn: uid=user,ou=People,o=your_host,dc=your_domain,dc=com
objectclass: top
objectclass: inetOrgPerson
objectclass: person
uid: user
cn: User
sn: Sample
userPassword: user
mail: user@your_host.your_domain.com
dn: uid=jduke,ou=People,o=your_host,dc=your_domain,dc=com
objectclass: top
objectclass: inetOrgPerson
objectclass: person
uid: jduke
cn: Java
sn: Duke
userPassword: theduke
mail: jduke@your_host.your_domain.com
dn: ou=Roles,o=your_host,dc=your_domain,dc=com
objectclass: top
objectclass: organizationalUnit
ou: Roles
dn: cn=Admin,ou=Roles,o=your_host,dc=your_domain,dc=com
objectClass: top
objectClass: groupOfNames
cn: Admin
description: Administrators
member: uid=admin,ou=People,o=your_host,dc=your_domain,dc=com
dn: cn=User,ou=Roles,o=your_host,dc=your_domain,dc=com
objectClass: top
objectClass: groupOfNames
cn: User
description: Users
member: uid=admin,ou=People,o=your_host,dc=your_domain,dc=com
member: uid=user,ou=People,o=your_host,dc=your_domain,dc=com
member: uid=jduke,ou=People,o=your_host,dc=your_domain,dc=com


Install EPP4.3
The installation of EPP4.3 is extremly simple.
First download the jboss-epp-4.3.GA_CP0X-src.zip here. You will need a Red Hat login and a valid subscription to download, if you don't know why: I covered it in an earlier post.
Then extract the zip file into the directory jboss-epp-4.3. That's it.


Setup EPP4.3 to use LDAP for credentials
You will have to change the following files in red to make LDAP work.

1. Within jboss-epp-4.3/jboss-as/server/default/deploy/jboss-portal.sar/META-INF/jboss-service.xml
change

      conf/identity/identity-config.xml

to

      conf/identity/ldap_identity-config.xml

2. Within jboss-epp-4.3/jboss-as/server/default/deploy/jboss-portal.sar/conf/identity/ldap_identity-config.xml

adapt the value tags that are linked to the following tags:

host

port

adminPassword

userCtxDN

roleCtxDN

(the be sure to choose the right value for userCtxDN and roleCtxDN connect to your LDAP browser and check the values)


3. Within jboss-epp-4.3/jboss-as/server/default/deploy/jboss-portal.sar/conf/identity/standardidentity-config.xml

adapt the value tags that are linked to the 5 tags seen in the section above.

4. Within jboss-epp-4.3/jboss-as/server/default/deploy/jboss-portal.sar/conf/login-config.xml
comment (do not use)

login-module code="org.jboss.portal.identity.auth.IdentityLoginModule"
uncomment (use)
login-module code="org.jboss.portal.identity.auth.SynchronizingLDAPExtLoginModule"
and adapt the variable to your configuration.
Connect to the portal
Now you should be able to connect to the portal:
http://localhost:8080/portal
with the user admin and password admin.
The default HSQL database users that come with the portal out of the box are admin and user. After migrating to LDAP they will only work if you have configured your portal properly. For example you have the possibility to authenticate users against LDAP + DB or only against LDAP. In this post users are only authenicated against LDAP! And 3 users available are the ones imported into the LDAP with the *.ldif file: admin, user, jduke.


If you still have problems check out the section "Troubleshooting JBoss Portal"