organic thoughts

JmxBuilder has been officially incorporated in Groovy for the 1.6 RC-1 release. I am delighted that the Groovy team thought highly of JmxBuilder to make it an addition to the language. JmxBuilder will have much more features in 2009. Special thanks to Guillame Laforge and the rest of the Groovy team for all their help in integrating the two projects.

Because of this change, JmxBuilder will be moved from its current Google code location once everything is migrated to codehaus.

JmxBuilder 0.5 (beta) has been released. After some constructive feedback (see previous post about JmxBuilder in April on Dzone), I redesigned the DSL to be more robust, compact, and added new features to help export and programmatically manage MBeans at runtime. The new features focus on building JMX agents, Jmx clients, and participate in the JMX event model. So, here it is:

Full description at http://code.google.com/p/groovy-jmx-builder/

JmxBuilder is a Groovy-based domain specific language for the Java Management Extension (JMX) API. It uses the builder pattern to create an internal DSL that facilitates the exposure of Java and Groovy beans for runtime control and management via the MBean server.The Groovy JMX Builder DSL hides the complexity of creating and exporting management beans via the JMX API and provides a set of natural constructs to interact with the JMX infrastructure.

Features

• Domain Specific Language (DSL) for JMX API using Builder pattern
• Simplified JMX API’s programmability
• Maintain the natural Groovy syntax
• Declaratively expose Java/Groovy objects as JMX managed MBeans
• Support class-embedded or explicit descriptors
• Inherent support for JMX’s event model
• Seamlessly create JMX event broadcasters
• Attach event listeners as inline closures
• Use Groovy’s dynamic nature to easily react to JMX events notifications
• Provides a flexible registration policy for MBean
• No special interfaces or class path restrictions
• Shields developer from complexity of JMX API
• Exposes attribute, constructors, operations, parameters, and notifications
• Simplifies the creation of connector servers and connector clients
• Support for exporting JMX timers

Learn More
Here is where you can get more information about JmxBuilder

• Groovy.Dzone Writeup
• JmxBuilder Project Site
• JmxBuilder Reference

Check it out.

When I saw JavaFax at last’s and this year’s at JavaOne, I did walked out of the presentations a bit skeptical “… yeah right, how is Sun’s going to compete with the deadly Adobe Flex/Flash combination … it’s marketing gimmic” . Well today (and if you been following JavaFx, for a while) Sun finally made good on its promise of delivering a Rich Media platform by officially releasing the SDK for JavaFx (at http://javafx.com, the site is being slammed, everything is slow now).

I must say that I am less skeptical now and cautiously optimistic on the future of Java as a rich media platform. This could actually work.

Java as viable rich medium
Using JDK 6 update 10 (released earlier) as a base, you now can see how applets are positioning themselves to be a formidable option to the Flex/Flash combo.

1. Applets load gracefully

2. Online streaming videos with Applets
Here is something you have never done/seen before with Java applets. Online videos, cool!

3. Rich Applet
Look at the skinning, the rich interaction options provided by this applet, yes this not flash, it’s a Java applet

JavaFx.Com
The site has been redesigned and contains tons of examples and code for you to get started. I have already dowloaded the SDK today and will start playing around with the technology. You may encounter heavy traffic.

I hope that this is just a start and Sun and the Java community continues to support this effort that I think all Java developer will benefit from.