Since my last post, lots of people have been asking me what exactly I’ve been doing with HyperJaxb3 and REST (jax-rs). In this post I’ll try and explain what I wanted to get out of this RESTful service prototype…
What was I trying to achieve?
- I wanted to learn how use the power of RESTful services, JAXB and JPA to create a very simple prototype service that can be used to Create, Read, Update, and Delete a simple XSD structure.
- I wanted an XSD based data model to sit right at the core of this project. The XSD would describe all the entities used by the application and govern all communications between the client and the service. The XSD would preferably also control the Java data model and the JPA database structure (DDL) in order to keep things simple.
- I wanted to create something quickly. I’m doing this prototype in my limited personal-time and I get bored with long drawn out projects when I’m working alone like this.
Why did I want to build this prototype?
In the past I have designed WSDL first SOAP services that have used proprietary products like BEA AquaLogic Data Services Platform (a.k.a. ‘Oracle Data Service Integrator’) to hande CRUD operations on an XSD document via a SOAP/WSDL interface.
Having used these products, I felt that they were a bit bloated, clunky, expensive and not particularly user friendly. Developers generally did not like these products and gave me some grief for towing the company line. That experience left me with a desire to ‘explore other options’.
If I could find an alternative to these products that was cheaper, simpler, faster and easier to work with – I’d be onto a winner.
What ‘User Story’ does my prototype implement?
Many companies need a Product Information Management system to keep track of product data. At the heart of these products is a simple CRUD mechanism for storing details about Products or Items. As I have some exposure to these systems it seemed like a logical place to start.
Was HyperJaxb in the frame from the start?
No. I discovered HyperJaxb3 during my ‘spike’ phase when I was looking for ways to combine JPA and JAXB. Of course once I’d found HyperJaxb3 I really wanted to make it work because it makes things so much simpler.
In my next post I’ll cover some details about the project’s build which does full integration testing using an embedded JEE server. Subscribe now to get an alert when I post…
Ben Wilcock 