Method and apparatus for providing a pluggable and extendable J2EE architecture

• US 20060026591A1
• Filed: 08/02/2004
• Published: 02/02/2006
• Est. Priority Date: 08/02/2004
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: Brauneis, David N. Jr., Daniel, Brent Hames, Mitchell, Christopher Creighton, Ramakrishnan, Ramya, Backhouse, Richard Andrew
• Granted Patent: US 7,509,638 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 717/177
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/60 Software deployment
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/44526 Plug-ins; Add-ons

Abstract

A method and apparatus for providing a pluggable and extendable J2EE architecture are provided. The method and apparatus provide mechanisms for defining extension points within modules of the J2EE application and mechanisms for defining plug-in or extension modules that may be integrated into the J2EE application via these extension points. In addition, a mechanism for merging the plug-in or extension modules into the J2EE application at deployment is provided such that all of the information necessary for generating instantiations of the plug-in or extension modules is integrated into the J2EE application configuration files. As a result, an integrated J2EE application is made possible from a modularized and extendable development of the J2EE application.

Claims

1. A method, in a data processing system, for deploying an enterprise application into a runtime environment, comprising:

identifying one or more extension points in a module of the enterprise application;

identifying one or more plug-in modules defining extensions of the extension point; and

integrating the one or more plug-in modules into the enterprise application based on configuration information associated with the one or more plug-in modules and the one or more extension points.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein integrating the one or more plug-in modules into the enterprise application includes:

processing one or more manifest files associated with the one or more plug-in modules to thereby generate configuration information for the one or more plug-in modules; and

merging the configuration information for the one or more plug-in modules into one or more configuration files of the enterprise application.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the one or more plug-in modules provide extended functionality to the enterprise application thereby permitting the enterprise application to perform functions that it could not prior to integration of the one or more plug-n modules.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein integrating the one or more plug-in modules into the enterprise application includes packaging the one or more plug-in modules into a web archive file associated with the enterprise application.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the enterprise application is a Java 2 Enterprise Edition (J2EE) application.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the one or more plug-in modules are identified in the configuration information based on a Uniform Resource Identifier (URI) associated with the one or more plug-in modules.

7. The method of claim 2, wherein the manifest file is an extensible markup language (XML) file that identifies the functionality of the plug-in module and identifies an extension point through which the plug-in module may be extended.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein a schema is associated with each extension point of the one or more extension points, and wherein a plug-in module must conform to the schema of an extension point in order to extend the functionality of the enterprise application using that extension point.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein the one or more plug-in modules includes a plurality of plug-in modules, and wherein at least one of the plurality of plug-in modules is an extension of another one of the plurality of plug-in modules.

10. A computer program product in a computer readable medium for deploying an enterprise application into a runtime environment, comprising:

first instructions for identifying one or more extension points in a module of the enterprise application;

second instructions for identifying one or more plug-in modules defining extensions of the extension point; and

third instructions for integrating the one or more plug-in modules into the enterprise application based on configuration information associated with the one or more plug-in modules and the one or more extension points.

11. The computer program product of claim 10, wherein the third instructions for integrating the one or more plug-in modules into the enterprise application include:

instructions for processing one or more manifest files associated with the one or more plug-in modules to thereby generate configuration information for the one or more plug-in modules; and

instructions for merging the configuration information for the one or more plug-in modules into one or more configuration files of the enterprise application.

12. The computer program product of claim 10, wherein the one or more plug-in modules provide extended functionality to the enterprise application thereby permitting the enterprise application to perform functions that it could not prior to integration of the one or more plug-n modules.

13. The computer program product of claim 10, wherein the third instructions for integrating the one or more plug-in modules into the enterprise application include instructions for packaging the one or more plug-in modules into a web archive file associated with the enterprise application.

14. The computer program product of claim 10, wherein the enterprise application is a Java 2 Enterprise Edition (J2EE) application.

15. The computer program product of claim 10, wherein the one or more plug-in modules are identified in the configuration information based on a Uniform Resource Identifier (URI) associated with the one or more plug-in modules.

16. The computer program product of claim 11, wherein the manifest file is an extensible markup language (XML) file that identifies the functionality of the plug-in module and identifies an extension point through which the plug-in module may be extended.

17. The computer program product of claim 10, wherein a schema is associated with each extension point of the one or more extension points, and wherein a plug-in module must conform to the schema of an extension point in order to extend the functionality of the enterprise application using that extension point.

18. The computer program product of claim 10, wherein the one or more plug-in modules includes a plurality of plug-in modules, and wherein at least one of the plurality of plug-in modules is an extension of another one of the plurality of plug-in modules.

20. The apparatus of claim 10, wherein the means for integrating the one or more plug-in modules into the enterprise application include:

means for processing one or more manifest files associated with the one or more plug-in modules to thereby generate configuration information for the one or more plug-in modules; and

means for merging the configuration information for the one or more plug-in modules into one or more configuration files of the enterprise application.

19. An apparatus for deploying an enterprise application into a runtime environment, comprising:

means for identifying one or more extension points in a module of the enterprise application;

means for identifying one or more plug-in modules defining extensions of the extension point; and

means for integrating the one or more plug-in modules into the enterprise application based on configuration information associated with the one or more plug-in modules and the one or more extension points.