Declarative Security

Declarative security means that the security mechanism for an application is declared and handled externally to the application. Deployment descriptors describe the Java EE application's security structure, including security roles, access control, and authentication requirements.

Sun Java System Web Server 7.0 supports the DTDs specified by the Java EE 1.4 specification, and has additional security elements included in its own deployment descriptors. Declarative security is the application deployers responsibility.