Writing an EJB 2.0 stateless session bean in RSA

1.    Go to Window> Preferences> General> Capabilities, and in the dialog, choose Enable All, and Apply.
2.    Go to Window> Preferences> Java >Compiler.  Ensure that the JDK Compliance is 5.0.
3.    Go to Window> Preferences> Java> Installed JREs and make sure Websphere v6.1 JRE is selected.
4.    Go to  Project,  and check "Build Automatically".

Create Enterprise Application Project(EAR) and Enterprise Java Bean Project (EJB)

1. Switch  to the J2EE  perspective  and  create a new Enterprise Application  Project using File >New>Other.
2. In the  New dialog box, find  the J2EE section, then select  Enterprise Application  Project,  click Next.

     

3.    Name your project "HeadFirstEJB-ear". Click the Finish button. Note: You may see an error on the EAR project, this is OK;  this is because there is no EJB project in the EAR yet.
4.    Now create the  EJB project.  File>  New>  Other.
5.    Find the  EJB section,  select EJB  Project,  and  click Next.
6.    Name the project "HeadFirstEJB-ejb", make sure the "Add project to an EAR" checkbox is selected and the EAR Project is HeadFirstEJB-ear. Press Next.

7.    Skip the  Project Facets screen  by clicking the  Next  button.

8.    On the EJB module screen, make sure to uncheck the "Create an EJB Client Jar module to hold the client interfaces and classes" checkbox, then click Finish.

Note: You  may see  an  error on the  EJB  project; this  is ok,  as  there  are  no  beans  in the  project yet.

Go to the  Project Explorer window and expand  both the  EAR and  EJB projects.

Create Session Bean:

In RSA, select the Project Explorer and expand the EJB project, then expand the Deployment Descriptor section. It should look similar to this:

we are creating a Session bean called "Advice".

1.   Right-click on the Session  Beans entry, and  select New> Session  Bean

2.   In the Create an Enterprise Bean dialog, name the bean Advice, and ensure that     the package name is ejbs. Note: Do NOT NAME IT "ADVICE BEAN'', then press Next.

 

     3. On the next screen, you shouldn't have to change anything, but should note that the wizard is going to create the three files (one class and two interfaces)

 

4. Press Next twice  (skipping the  EJB Java Class Details screen). On the Select Class Diagram for Visualization screen, uncheck the "Add bean to Class Diagram" checkbox and then press Finish. There will now be no errors on the projects.

5. Now if you  expand the Advice  bean  section in the  project explorer, you should be able to see the three files that  have been  created for you  by the wizard.   See the  following:




Bean Class:
If you double-click the AdviceBean class in the project ,explorer, it will open up the bean class.

Note that the wizard has already created the boilerplate code for the Session Bean interface as well as the creation method: ejbCreate(), ejbActivate(), ejbPassivate(), ejbRemove() and

setSessionContext( SessionContext ). The wizard also created a seriaiVersionUID that is recommended for any class that is serializable. The Session Bean interface extends Serializable. There is also a mySessionCtx variable to hold the session context that is set by the server. The server will call setSessionContext() during the beans lifecycle.

Type in the getAdvice() method in thw AdviceBean.java file. Take a look at the Advice.java interface file. You will need to add the getAdvice() method signature to it. There's another way to have RSA add your method signatures to the interfaces, but for now, do it by hand.

In the  AdviceHome.java  interface, the wizard  has taken  care of the create()  method for you.

Viewing the  Deployment Descriptor:Select and expand the EJB project. In the J2EE Perspective, you can open the Deployment Descriptor by double-clicking on the entry (Deployment Descriptor) just below the HeadFirstEJB-ejb. Or you can open the ejbModule folder, expand the META-INF folder, and then double-click on the ejb-jar.xml file. This will open the Deployment Descriptor editor.

At this point you can view the Deployment Descriptor to see what RSA has created. It is worth noting that when using the J2EE perspective, RSA displays in slightly different fashion than when in the Java perspective. After opening the project, switch back and forth, and observe the differences.

There are tabs along the bottom of the editor which  present a user friendly view of the  Descriptor.   (Do

not be concerned with  understanding everything that is being presented.)    By default, the source tab is

not open for view.   Find the Source tab, and  click on it.  You should  see the following.

Deploying the  Application:

At this point, you have an application that can actually be deployed to the server. Before you can deploy the application however, you need to generate the deployment code. This process generates the code needed to facilitate the remote EJB call from the client.

1. In the Package Explorer, select the EJB project, right-click on it. In the selection list about 3/4 down choose Prepare For Deployment. Note: There will be no successful completion message; if you do not see an error, the process was successful. Examine the new contents of the ejbModule folder to see the new artifacts & packages that RSA created. The generated code will be distinctive and will have names prefaced with an underscore and/or EJS. See the following:

2.    If there is no server view pane open, open it now (Window> Show View> Servers). When creating a new workspace, RSA should have created a server(s) by default. If there are no servers present in the view, right-click in the server pane and create a new server- you can use the default RSA profile. Now start the server and ensure that it starts correctly by viewing the console output- you should see no errors.

3.     You are now ready to deploy the application. In the server pane, select the server. Right-click and choose Add and Remove Projects from the list. This will bring up the following dialog:

 

4.The  EAR project will appear in the Available  Projects section.   Click the Add  button to move the project to the Configured  projects, and  click Finish.

5. You will see  activity in the console. Check the console for successful installation. Among other information, you should see a line of text containing the following: Application    started:
HeadFirstEJB-ear.  Right-click on the server and select Stop. 

 RSA-  Universal Test Client
We will now examine a built in facility in RSA to test EJBs.
Excerpt from  IBM  Help  Center:

Universal  Test Client:
The server tools provide you with a Web-based Universal Test Client where you can test your enterprise beans and other Java objects running in a local or remote server. Using this test client, you can test the local or remote interface methods of your enterprise beans. By calling the methods and passing user-defined arguments you can test the methods to ensure that they work correctly.

Using  the  Universal  Test  Client,  you  can  accomplish  the  following  tasks:

• Find  an  enterprise  bean  when  you  know  or do  not  know  the  JNDI  name
• Call  a  method
• Remove  an  enterprise  bean
• View  public  fields  of methods
• View  fields
• View  methods
• Filter the  methods  displayed  in  the  Universal  Test  Client

Following, are some basic steps to  use the  Universal Test Client:

1. If your server is not still  running from the  previous exercise,  please  start it now.
2. Right-click on the 6.1  server in the server view,  and  select Run  Universal Test  Client  (third
option from the  bottom of list).  The test client  page should  appear.
3. In the  upper left of the pane,  click on JNDI  Explorer.   This will display information in the  right pane.



4. Now in the  right-hand  pane and  expand the ejb folder. Expand the ejbs folder and  click on the AdviceHome  entry.


5. Now look in the  upper left corner of the  pane.  Expand the AdviceHome  entry and  click Advice Create()

6.    In the  right-hand  pane click on the  Invoke  button. This calls the create()  on  Home interface.


7.   Now another button appears just below the  Invoke button.  Click the Work  with  Object  button.


8. You will  see another entry appear in  upper left called  Advice  1.   Click on this entry to expand it.
9. The methods available in the Advice bean- getAdvice() is displayed.

10. Click on the getAdvice()  method.  An  Invoke button will  now appear in the  right-hand  pane.


11.    Click the  Invoke  button in the  right  pane and the output from getAdvice() will  be displayed!