ejb-in-ear: Deployment of an EAR Containing a JSF WAR and EJB JAR

Author: Paul Robinson
Level: Intermediate
Technologies: EJB, EAR
Summary: The ejb-in-ear quickstart demonstrates how to deploy an EAR archive that contains a JSF WAR and an EJB JAR.
Target Product: JBoss EAP
Source: https://github.com/jboss-developer/jboss-eap-quickstarts/

What is it?

The ejb-in-ear quickstart demonstrates the deployment of an EAR artifact to Red Hat JBoss Enterprise Application Platform. The EAR contains: JSF WAR and an EJB JAR.

The example is composed of three Maven projects, each with a shared parent. The projects are as follows:

  1. ejb: This project contains the EJB code and can be built independently to produce the JAR archive.

  2. web: This project contains the JSF pages and the managed bean.

  3. ear: This project builds the EAR artifact and pulls in the EJB and Web artifacts.

The root pom.xml builds each of the subprojects in the above order and deploys the EAR archive to the server.

The example follows the common "Hello World" pattern. These are the steps that occur:

  1. A JSF page asks the user for their name.
  2. On clicking Greet, the name is sent to a managed bean named Greeter.
  3. On setting the name, the Greeter invokes the GreeterEJB, which was injected to the managed bean. Notice the field annotated with @EJB.
  4. The response from invoking the GreeterEJB is stored in a field (message) of the managed bean.
  5. The managed bean is annotated as @SessionScoped, so the same managed bean instance is used for the entire session. This ensures that the message is available when the page reloads and is displayed to the user.

System Requirements

The application this project produces is designed to be run on Red Hat JBoss Enterprise Application Platform 7.1 or later.

All you need to build this project is Java 8.0 (Java SDK 1.8) or later and Maven 3.3.1 or later. See Configure Maven for JBoss EAP 7.1 to make sure you are configured correctly for testing the quickstarts.

Use of EAP7_HOME

In the following instructions, replace EAP7_HOME with the actual path to your JBoss EAP installation. The installation path is described in detail here: Use of EAP7_HOME and JBOSS_HOME Variables.

Start the Server

  1. Open a command prompt and navigate to the root of the JBoss EAP directory.

  2. The following shows the command line to start the server:

     For Linux:   EAP7_HOME/bin/standalone.sh
     For Windows: EAP7_HOME\bin\standalone.bat
    

Build and Deploy the Quickstart

  1. Make sure you have started the JBoss EAP server as described above.

  2. Open a command prompt and navigate to the root directory of this quickstart.

  3. Type this command to build and deploy the archive:

     mvn clean install wildfly:deploy
    
  4. This will deploy ear/target/ejb-in-ear.ear to the running instance of the server.

Access the Application

The application will be running at the following URL http://localhost:8080/ejb-in-ear/.

Enter a name in the input field and click the Greet button to see the response.

Undeploy the Archive

  1. Make sure you have started the JBoss EAP server as described above.

  2. Open a command prompt and navigate to the root directory of this quickstart.

  3. When you are finished testing, type this command to undeploy the archive:

     mvn wildfly:undeploy
    

Run the Quickstart in Red Hat JBoss Developer Studio or Eclipse

You can also start the server and deploy the quickstarts or run the Arquillian tests from Eclipse using JBoss tools. For general information about how to import a quickstart, add a JBoss EAP server, and build and deploy a quickstart, see Use JBoss Developer Studio or Eclipse to Run the Quickstarts.

For this quickstart, follow the special instructions to build Quickstarts Containing an EAR.

  1. Right-click on the ejb-in-ear-ear subproject, and choose Run As --> Run on Server.
  2. Choose the server and click Finish.
  3. This starts the server, deploys the application, and opens a browser window that accesses the running application.
  4. To undeploy the project, right-click on the ejb-in-ear-ear project and choose Run As --> Maven build. Enter wildfly:undeploy for the Goals and click Run.

Debug the Application

If you want to debug the source code of any library in the project, run the following command to pull the source into your local repository. The IDE should then detect it.

    mvn dependency:sources