Professional Apache Tomcat 6 (WROX Professional Guides) (Paperback)

by Vivek Chopra (Author), Sing Li (Author), Jeff Genender (Author)
Key Phrases: persistent session manager, performance tuning, tomcat installation, Apache Web, Attribute Name Read, Write Type (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description

• Tomcat is the official reference implementation of Sun's servlet and JSP specifications, and Java developers must test all Web applications on Tomcat to ensure they work as designed
• Boasting more than 40 percent new and updated material, this book covers all the major new features affecting server administration and management
• Explores the additional built-in tools of Tomcat, which help Java developers program more efficiently, and looks at how Apache's other open source servlet/JSP technologies are designed to work with Tomcat
• Features full coverage of Release 6, which supports the latest JSP and servlet specifications: JSP 2.1 and Servlets 2.5
• Addresses solving real-world problems encountered during all phases of server administration, including managing class loaders and connectors, security, shared hosting and clustering, and system testing

From the Back Cover
With this comprehensive resource, you'll uncover the ins-and-outs of installing, configuring, and running the Apache Tomcat server. This book not only provides a line-by-line analysis of configuration options, but also explores the features and capabilities of Tomcat. You'll then gain the skills to solve the type of problems that arise during all phases of system administration, including shared hosting, security, system testing, and performance testing and tuning.

Focusing exclusively on Tomcat 6, the book takes you through all of the latest architectural and performance changes. You'll progress from basic Tomcat and web application configuration to more advanced techniques for clustering, JDBC connectivity, logging, and much more. All of this will help you effectively manage and administer your Tomcat deployment.

What you will learn from this book

• How to install the JVM and Tomcat on Windows and Unix/Linux systems

• Steps for packaging and deploying web applications

• Configuring Tomcat's internal HTTP protocol stack, including the new APR and NIO Connectors

• Deploying Tomcat with the Apache Web server or Microsoft IIS as the front-end Web servers

• Load balancing and clustering a farm of Tomcat servers

• Ways to install Tomcat in virtual hosting situations

• How to load test web applications deployed in Tomcat

• Monitoring Tomcat servers in real-time by tapping into internally maintained statistics

• Techniques for providing scalability and high availability to web applications

• Performance tips and best practices for Tomcat 6

Who this book is for

This book is for J2EE system administrators and Java developers who are responsible for Tomcat configuration, performance tuning, system security, or deployment architecture.

Wrox Professional guides are planned and written by working programmers to meet the real-world needs of programmers, developers, and IT professionals. Focused and relevant, they address the issues technology professionals face every day. They provide examples, practical solutions, and expert education in new technologies, all designed to help programmers do a better job.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 629 pages
• Publisher: Wrox; 1 edition (August 13, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0471753610
• ISBN-13: 978-0471753612
• Product Dimensions: 9.4 x 7.2 x 1.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #73,391 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Just what I ordered!, January 8, 2008

By	David O'Meara "JavaRanch Sheriff" (Australia) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

I was really impressed with this book and felt like it had been written with my requirements in mind. The other Tomcat books I have read felt like they were paraphrasing the online help; additional material was provided, but little of it was new. While reading the first few chapters of this book, several of my ongoing queries had been answered, and there were a bunch of other gems as well - it sorted out my AJP and APR queries, gave options for running Tomcat on privileged ports without running as root, and dug further into the server.xml configuration than I

Professional Apache Tomcat 6 (WROX Professional Guides) is aimed at the serious Tomcat user. It will be useful to people that do serious tinkering at home, but it is a an absolute bible if you have Tomcat running production code or other critical uses.

Personally I found that the level of information did not always provide 100% coverage but, for example, the level of detail provided covering server.xml, web.xml and context.xml configuration will be of great use. The descriptions go into plenty of detail but rarely goes overboard. Examples of places to hook into or extend the existing functionality are pointed out, but the authors don't get distracted in providing sample implementations when the defaults are sufficient. The information is full of the sort professional advice and directions that I would expect from a book of this name, and that has been sadly missing from the other offerings I have seen.

As a short description, it covers topics like AJP connectors, Apache Portable Runtime libraries, configuring Tomcat behind IIS or Apache servers, clustering, shared hosting, oodles of configuration options, and also takes two chapters to look at testing the performance and then tuning applications running Tomcat.

If I had to provide negative comments, I would say that the book was written by three authors and at times it doesn't mesh well and it is clear that one section had a different author to another. There were also a couple of areas that didn't have the coverage I had hoped, but in most cases an explanation was given as to why this was done.

Realistically I find it difficult to fault this book and look forward to migrating our own servers to Tomcat 6 and tweaking the behaviour using the information provided. With this book in hand I feel completely confident that I have the know-how to set up the environment correctly.

3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars If you are going to buy one book on Tomcat, this is it!, April 4, 2008

By	Damodar Chetty (Minnesota, US [www.swengsol.com]) - See all my reviews (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

I'm usually very skeptical of books with multiple authors as they rarely turn out to have either consistent quality or consistent pacing. So, I picked this up with very low expectations.

Needless to say I was very pleasantly surprised. It has the perfect combination of detail (which means that you're going to use it as a reference book for a long while), and clarity of explanations (which means that you're going to be the richer for it.)

At many times it does take the scenic route (e.g., it takes 2 chapters before you even install Tomcat), but for the most part, the information is well written and easy to read.

One example of the excellent detail of coverage - there's an entire section on verifying the integrity of the download using the MD5 checksum/PGP. What could be a better start for a chapter on Tomcat Security?

You may want to consider Tomcat the Definitive Guide as a companion volume. That book has more of a practitioner's feel to it, and rounds off areas that this one does not cover very well (such as running Tomcat on different operating systems, or using CATALINA_BASE to run multiple Tomcat instances off a single Tomcat distribution).

Damodar Chetty (swengsol.com)