laststation.net

With the JBoss JAX-RS implementation RESTEasy reaching version 1.0.1.GA I have finally managed to switch over from Jersey. Because my latest project has got all internal services and framework components represented as a JBossMC beans I needed a simple way how to export them directly as Restful resources without requiring any unnecessary boiler plate code.

I got inspired by Spring integration (which comes as part of the RESTEasy distribution) and wrote own resteasy-int-jbossmc which can be used under JBoss AS 5.0. Main difference is the application context scope – with Spring it has to be deployed as part of the same web application, whereas when deployed under JBossAS beans are instantiated within the microcontainer of the whole application server. To prevent scanning of unnecessary code I had to use feature called scoped kernel/controller and force restful resources to be scoped into own context, where they can be easily located.

Configuration (done in web.xml) then looks like this:

<web-app>
    <display-name>Archetype Created Web Application</display-name>

    <!-- configuration -->
    <context-param>
        <param-name>jbossmc-int.name</param-name>
        <param-value>APPLICATION</param-value>
    </context-param>

    <context-param>
        <param-name>jbossmc-int.qualifier</param-name>
        <param-value>demo-app</param-value>
    </context-param>

    <!-- RESTEasy bootstrap -->

    <listener>
        <listener-class>org.jboss.resteasy.plugins.server.servlet.ResteasyBootstrap</listener-class>
    </listener>

    <!--
       !! Integration has to be configured after Reasteasy Bootstrap !!
    -->
    <listener>
        <listener-class>net.laststation.tools.resteasy.plugins.MicrocontainerContextListener</listener-class>
    </listener>

    <servlet>
        <servlet-name>Resteasy</servlet-name>
        <servlet-class>org.jboss.resteasy.plugins.server.servlet.HttpServletDispatcher</servlet-class>
    </servlet>

    <!-- seems like mapping for now doesn't anything else than /* -->
    <servlet-mapping>
        <servlet-name>Resteasy</servlet-name>
        <url-pattern>/*</url-pattern>
    </servlet-mapping>
</web-app>

The integration is configured by jbossmc-int.name, specifying scoped context you want to use (APPLICATION is recommended), and the jbossmc-int.qualifier with he scope name itself (demo-app in this case). Also, please, note that ResteasyBootstrap must be configured first as it exports object required by MicrocontainerContextListener.

To export objects is then as easy as deploying them to microcontainer. Can be done using BeanMetadataBuilder, annotation or XML deployment descriptor as demostrated here:

<deployment xmlns="urn:jboss:bean-deployer:2.0">
    <bean name="library" class="net.laststation.demo.model.Library">
        <annotation>@org.jboss.metadata.plugins.scope.ApplicationScope("demo-app")</annotation>
    </bean>
</deployment>

The bean is exposed to MicrocontainerContextListener by annotation @ApplicationScope, which in this case specifies name ‘demo-app’.

Known Limitations

JBoss Microcontainer kernel scoping support at the prototype stages. Also similar to the Spring integration, Resteasy Servlet Dispatched must be mapped to the /*, otherwise it won’t work.

Download

Source code is available within my public BitBucket respository.

• resteasy-int-jbossmc