Sun Microsystems aims to make its mark in the Java
application server space with its upcoming Sun ONE Application
Server 7 Enterprise Edition.
Having trailed companies such as BEA Systems and IBM in market
share, Sun is looking to turn things around by focusing on a
high-availability database layer in a product based on the
technology garnered from its 2002 acquisition of Clustra
Systems.
Sun intends its high-availability technology to ensure 99.999
uptime for key applications such as e-commerce transactional
systems.
The high-availability database layer features transaction state
information, and transactional loads can be shifted between
application servers in the network as needed.
Version 6.5 of the enterprise application server has had
high-availability support, but Version 7's support of the Clustra
technology boosts real-time database functionality and scalability
to 24 processors per system. Version 7 is also compliant with the
J2EE 1.3 Java specification.
Sun will add J2EE 1.4 compliance to the application server,
featuring conformity to web services specifications, next
year.
Load balancing in Version 7 will enable uptime when taking down
an application server for maintenance. The high-availability layer
also enables performance boosts through the addition of more
processors, rather than having to add more application servers.
Paul Krill writes for InfoWorld