RE: [WEB400] Webfacing

[Buck Calabro <Buck.Calabro@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

>I want to use webfacing.

The whole web area is a minefield.  Having established my feelings on the
matter, you now know what size salt truck to order when reading the
following...

I have run WebFacing on the following combinations:
Tomcat / Apache (both IBM supplied)
WAS 3.5.4 Adv / Classic HTTP
WAS 3.5.4 Adv / Apache
WAS 4.0.2 Adv / Classic HTTP

WAS 3.5 was originally scheduled to be de-supported this year but has a new
lease on life, mostly because WAS 3.5.4 Std is free and no other WAS is.
There was such a hue and cry that IBM relented and decided to extend support
of the free WAS.

WAS 3.5.x is IBM's best guess at what J2EE would look like.  They didn't
quite get it right because they were ahead of the standard!  So, they went
back to the drawing board and came out with a completely J2EE compatible
version - WAS 4.0.  Why did I bother with all this?  Because 4.0 is Quite
Different from 3.5, and whatever you learn about 3.5 you can basically
forget about when moving to 4.0 (and you WILL move.)  4.0 is closer to
Tomcat than it is to 3.5.

The difference between the 4.0 Adv and 4.0 AES versions is that you can't
cluster the AES version.  Both support EJBs, but you won't need EJB support
for WebFacing.  WebFacing can produce individual servlets for WAS 3.5 or a
WAR file for Tomcat/WAS 4.0.

My strong advice is to subscribe to the WAS newsgroups and read the archives
there.  Almost all of my questions were answered in the archives.  Also, The
WebFacing tool is a slam dunk.  You can probably convert your application
without reading the instructions, but read them anyway, because you will
want to get used to the nomenclature and terminology.

Be aware that no version of WAS is current.  You WILL want the latest group
PTFs for Database, Java, HTTP and WAS.  You will also want to go visit the
WAS website and get the PC fixpack that matches your iSeries WAS version.
For 3.5.5, you want fixpack 5 for Windows.  For 4.0.2, you want fixpack 2.
In order to administer WAS you need a console.  A console that runs on
Windows NT.  So, you install WAS on iSeries AND on NT, then you apply the
iSeries PTFs and the NT fixpack.

Finally (you thought I'd never quit, didn't you?) before you touch
WebFacing, bring up WAS and run Snoop using the Classic HTTP server.  That
was by far the hardest part of my journey.  Once you get Snoop running,
WebFace a small application and deploy it to WAS and off you go.  I get
response time in the 2.7 second range after the first touch on my model 820
with 3 gig of RAM.
  --buck