A Full CDI 1.1 Course on Pluralsight

I’m happy to announce that my course on CDI 1.1 has been published on PluralSight. This 3:40 hours long course is divided in several modules : Introduction (17:48) : Why do we need dependency injection in our applications, how do we usually do it, how can CDI help us Understanding Context and Dependency Injection (20:24) : Get the basis of what CDI is, what it’s … Continue reading A Full CDI 1.1 Course on Pluralsight

The Paris JUG President is leaving, long live the President!

Exactly 7 years ago we had our first Paris JUG meeting. It was held in a small room, already packed with 40 people. A few meetings later, we had to move to another venue, and another one, and another one. Today, 7 years after, the Paris JUG gathers more than 200 people during its monthly meeting. And today, I’m officially communicating that I’m leaving the … Continue reading The Paris JUG President is leaving, long live the President!

Micro Benchmarking with JMH: Measure, don’t guess!

I’m sure you’ve all heard that assigning a variable to null helps the Garbage Collector, or not declaring a method final improves in lining…. But what you also know is that JVMs have evolved drastically and what was true yesterday may not be true today. So, how do we know that our code performs? Well, we don’t, because we are not supposed to guess what the JVM does… we just … Continue reading Micro Benchmarking with JMH: Measure, don’t guess!

Generating Database Schemas with JPA 2.1

Prior JPA 2.1, most JPA providers (Hibernate, EclipseLink, OpenJPA) would have a proprietary way to generate the database schema (Data Definition Language scripts) from Entities. In the JPA 2.1 specification (JSR 338) there is a new section called 9.4 Schema Generation introducing an API and some properties to generate a database schema in a standard and portable way. Properties in persistence.xml In the history of JPA specification, we … Continue reading Generating Database Schemas with JPA 2.1

There Is No “Cluster” in Java EE

Very often, when talking/training/sharing about Java EE, I get the same question: What about clustering in Java EE? The answer is: nothing, rien, nada, ezer, nista, niets! There is nothing about clustering (failover, load-balancing…) in JavaEE. And to prove it, I’ve looked for the word “cluster” in the 4.171 pages of the 19 more important Java EE 7 specifications. The word “cluster” only appears once : EE.5.2.2 – Application … Continue reading There Is No “Cluster” in Java EE

Run a JBoss Forge “Hands-on-Lab” at Your Local User Group

For Devoxx Belgium 2014 I had the opportunity to run a 3 hours hands-on-lab on Java EE with JBoss Forge. The idea was to get people up and running with JBoss Forge by 1) installing Forge (CLI and JBDS), 2) playing with it and 3) developing an entire Java EE application and extend it by writing a JBoss Forge add-on. The trick with a hands-on-lab is you can end-up with … Continue reading Run a JBoss Forge “Hands-on-Lab” at Your Local User Group

The Uncensored Java EE 7 Book

Let’s start with a definition of Censorship: Censorship is the suppression of speech or other public communication which may be considered objectionable, harmful, sensitive, or inconvenient as determined by a government, media outlet, or other controlling body. As you might be aware if you follow this blog, I wrote a third book entitled Java EE 7. A technical book about Java EE which part of it managed to … Continue reading The Uncensored Java EE 7 Book

I Would Like Better AppServer Support in Intellij IDEA

Believe it or not, but I’ve been using Intellij IDEA for more than 10 years (I think it was back in 2003) and I love it ! Because of that, at each conference I go, I usually pay a visit to the JetBrains booth and chat with the guys. Mostly to tell them how good their products are, but also to give them some ideas about possible … Continue reading I Would Like Better AppServer Support in Intellij IDEA

Your tests assume that JBoss is up and running

As a Java EE developer I tend to mix unit tests with integrations tests, usually using Arquillian. But sometimes, for obscure reasons, Arquillian cannot do the job (let’s say the packaging of the application to test is too obscur). So I want to deploy my application, and then, execute some tests. But what I really want is my tests to be executed if and only if the … Continue reading Your tests assume that JBoss is up and running

Switching Datasource with CDI Alternatives and Stereotypes

Here we are, using H2 in our test environment, Derby in development and Postgres in production. It’s 2014, and Java EE still doesn’t have a decent configuration specification… So how do we change datasources in Java EE depending on our environment ? There are several possibilities (from external property files, Maven resource filtering, Maven profiles with different configuration or JNDI tricks) but this post will only concentrate on … Continue reading Switching Datasource with CDI Alternatives and Stereotypes

On-line Courses I Created for PluralSight

I am the author of several Java EE courses for Pluralsight. Plurasight has been around for more than 10 years, and has an impressive catalog of courses, several on Java and Java EE. Each course is made of slides, demos and you will have the pleasure to listen to my voice ;o)  No video of the speaker, but many screen recording for the demos.  Each course is … Continue reading On-line Courses I Created for PluralSight

Java EE 7 and JBoss Forge in Lille (FR) and London (UK)

Since the publication of my Java EE 7 book, my JavaOne and Devoxx Belgium talks (that you can find on Parleys), I’ve been quiet. But my 2014 new year’s resolution is to travel a few JUGs and conferences to spread the Java EE 7 word…. and I’m starting tomorrow! So if you want to know more about Java EE 7 and see a live demo … Continue reading Java EE 7 and JBoss Forge in Lille (FR) and London (UK)

Java EE 7 JavaDoc on Dash

I’ve recently discovered Dash. It’s an API documentation browser which gives you offline access to 130+ API documentation sets. So once it’s installed, you can download the docsets you want and here you are with a single tool for all your documentation. I’ve installed all the docsets I needeed (Javadoc, SQL documentation, Man, Boostrap 3, HTML 5, CSS…) and I find myself using it more and … Continue reading Java EE 7 JavaDoc on Dash

“Oh Lord, won’t you buy me a Mercedes Benz” (or RIP GlassFish)

Disclaimer : I am a former BEA employee, former Weblogic consultant, author of three books based on GlassFish and use JBoss extensively. Today I’m self-employed and therefore do not belong to any company. On the 4th of November 2013, Oracle announced the roadmap of GlassFish. It talks about version “4.1 scheduled for 2014“, alignment with Java EE 8 and so on… but the most important news … Continue reading “Oh Lord, won’t you buy me a Mercedes Benz” (or RIP GlassFish)

Several Architectural Styles with Java EE 7

If you are like me, in your career you came across Architects who want to homogenize every single application in the company : from the smallest web app to the biggest application. All projects have to conform to the 542 pages In-house Architectural Guide and develop a 6 tier application (it could be 5, 6, 7 or 8 tiers, look like architects are paid by … Continue reading Several Architectural Styles with Java EE 7

Books I’ve Written

Java EE 7

This book is a major update of the Beginning Java EE 6. All the chapters of existing specifications have been updated and two new chapters have been added (CDI and Bean Validation). This book starts by introducing Java EE 7 and some new language features of Java SE 7. Then follows 14 chapters introducing a technology (CDI 1.1, Bean Validation 1.1, JPA 2.1, EJB 3.2, JSF 2.2, XML and JSON processing, JMS 2.0, JAX-WS 2.3 and JAX-RS 2.0). Each chapter is illustrated with lots of code and UML diagrams and finishes with a Putting it all Together section, where you combine several Java EE 7 technologies to compose and application.
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Java EE 6

This book concentrates on Java EE 6 and highlights the new features of this release. It explores the innovations of this new version, and examines the various specifications and how to assemble them to develop applications. Java EE 6 consists of nearly 30 specifications and is an important milestone for the enterprise layer (EJB 3.1, JPA 2.0), for the web tier (Servlet 3.0, JSF 2.0), and for interoperability (SOAP web services and RESTful services). This book covers a broad part of the Java EE 6 specifications and uses the JDK 1.6 and some well-known design patterns, as well as the GlassFish application server, the Derby database, JUnit, and Maven. It is abundantly illustrated with UML diagrams, Java code, and screenshots.
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Java EE 5

The Java EE 5 book I’ve written is a practical book that tells you how to develop a e-commerce website using most of the Java EE 5 specifications. I uses a PetStore-like application to introduce EJB 3, JPA 1.0, JSF 1.2, JSP 2.1 and JMS. It’s written in French and is published by Eyrolles. To know more about it, click on the prefered language.
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Beginning Java EE 7… Book Arrived !

Update : the book has been published end of June 2013 I have been quiet on my blog lately but there was a reason: I was writing a Beginning Java EE 7 book for APress. I am using the past tense because I’ve finished writing it. I’ve gently started in November 2012 and accelerated the writing pace as I was following the updates of the specifications and reaching the Java … Continue reading Beginning Java EE 7… Book Arrived !

Sony Your Business Is Going Down… Is It a Reason To Play With Women ?

This post is not about Java, Java EE or even IT. It is about the state of our world or, to shrink it a bit, the state of advertisement, business… and women (I had blogged about something similar a few years ago) A few days ago a friend of mine who was skiing at La Plagne (France) Tweeted this photo asking “Am I the only one … Continue reading Sony Your Business Is Going Down… Is It a Reason To Play With Women ?

Test your JAX-RS 2.0 Web Service URIs… Without Mocks

After the announcement of the NoMock Movement I had to write another post about integration testing. Here it goes  : how to test your nice RESTful URIs ? Use Case Often you hear that URIs have to be expressive… and you want to test that your URIs are nicely written. How do you do that ? Unit testing with mock frameworks such as Restito or … Continue reading Test your JAX-RS 2.0 Web Service URIs… Without Mocks