Overview of Application Server Upgrades

The following sections describe general aspects of Application Server that affect upgrading to Java ES 5:

• About Java ES 5Application Server

• Application Server Upgrade Roadmap

• Application Server Data

• Application Server Compatibility Issues

• Application Server Dependencies

About Java ES 5Application Server

Java ES 5 Application Server represents selected bug fixes to the Java ES 4 version. Functionally Java ES 5 Application Server is the same as Java ES 4.

Application Server Upgrade Roadmap

The following table shows the supported Application Server upgrade paths to Java ES 5.

Table 6–1 Upgrade Paths to Java ES 5: Sun Java System Application Server Enterprise Edition 8.2

Java ES Release	Application Server Release	General Approach	Reconfiguration Required
Release 4	Sun Java System Application Server Enterprise Edition 8.1 2005Q4	Direct upgrade:Performed using coexistence	None

Application Server Data

The following table shows the type of data that could be affected by an upgrade of Application Server software.

Table 6–2 Application Server Data Usage

Type of Data	Location	Usage
Environment variables	ApplicationServer-base\config\asenv.bat	Global variables
Configuration data	ApplicationServer-base\domains\domainName\config	Configuration of Application Server instances
Deployment data	ApplicationServer-base\domains\domainName\applications	Configuration of J2EE container for specific J2EE components and applications

Application Server Compatibility Issues

Java ES 5 Application Server does not introduce any interface changes with respect to Java ES 4.

Application Server Dependencies

Application Server dependencies on other Java ES components can affect the procedure for upgrading and reconfiguring Application Server software. Changes in Application Server interfaces or functions, for example, could require upgraded versions of components upon which Application Server depends. The need to upgrade such components depends upon the specific upgrade path.

Application Server has dependencies on the following Java ES components:

• Shared components. Application Server has dependencies on specific Java ES shared components, as listed in Table 1–7.

• Message Queue. Application Server depends on Message Queue to provide J2EE Java Message Service-compliant asynchronous messaging support.

• HADB. Application Server depends on High Availability Database (HADB) for high availability storage of HTTP session and stateful session bean data. HADB is designed to support up to 99.999% service and data availability with load balancing, failover, and state recovery.

• NSS. Application Server depends on Network Security Service (NSS) for managing security.

• Web Container (optional). Application Server depends upon web container services for its optional load balancing plug-in. This support can be provided by Java ES Web Server.

• High Availability Session Store (optional). Application Server depends upon High Availability Session Store to maintain session state information needed to support failover between instances.