The Java EE 5 Tutorial

The confirmer Example Application

The confirmer example application demonstrates how to use an injected JavaMail session to send a confirmation email.

If you’ve ever ordered a product from a web site, you’ve probably received an email confirming your order. The ConfirmerBean class demonstrates how to send email from an enterprise bean.

Like a database connection, a mail session is a resource. In the Application Server, a mail session is called a JavaMail resource. The resource is injected into the class using @Resource and specifying the JNDI name of the resource. The type of the session field is javax.mail.Session.

@Resource(name="mail/myMailSession")
private Session session;

After calling several set methods on the Message object, sendNotice invokes the send method of the javax.mail.Transport class to send the message. The source code for the sendNotice method follows.

public void sendNotice(String recipient) {
    try {
        Message message = new MimeMessage(session);
        message.setFrom();
        message.setRecipients(Message.RecipientType.TO,
                InternetAddress.parse(recipient, false));
        message.setSubject("Test Message from ConfirmerBean");
        DateFormat dateFormatter = DateFormat
                .getDateTimeInstance(DateFormat.LONG,
                DateFormat.SHORT);
        Date timeStamp = new Date();

        String messageText = "Thank you for your order." + ’\n’
                + "We received your order on "
                + dateFormatter.format(timeStamp) + ".";
        message.setText(messageText);

        message.setHeader("X-Mailer", mailer);
        message.setSentDate(timeStamp);

        // Send message
        Transport.send(message);
        logger.info("Mail sent to " + recipient + ".");
    } catch (MessagingException ex) {
        ex.printStackTrace();
        logger.info("Error in ConfirmerBean for " + recipient);
    }
}

Running the confirmer Example Application

To run the confirmer example, follow these steps, as described in the following sections:

1. Create a mail session in the Admin Console.

2. Build the example.

3. Deploy the example.

4. Retrieve the client JAR.

5. Run the client JAR.

Creating a Mail Session

To create a mail session in the Application Server using the Admin Console, follow these steps:

1. Open the URL http://localhost:4848/asadmin in a browser.

2. Select the JavaMail Sessions node.

3. Click New.

4. Type mail/myMailSession in the JNDI Name field.

5. Type the name of the host running your mail server in the Mail Host field.

6. Type the destination email address in the Default User field.

7. Type your email address in the Default Return Address field.

8. Click OK.

   Note that mail/myMailSession is listed under the JavaMail Sessions node.

Building, Packaging, and Deploying confirmer in NetBeans IDE

Follow these instructions to build, package, and deploy the confirmer example to your Application Server instance using NetBeans IDE.

1. In NetBeans IDE, select File→Open Project.

2. In the Open Project dialog, navigate to tut-install/javaeetutorial5/examples/ejb/.

3. Select the confirmer folder.

4. Select the Open as Main Project and Open Required Projects check boxes.

5. Click Open Project.

6. In the Projects tab, right-click the confirmer project and select Undeploy and Deploy.

This builds and packages the application into confirmer.ear, located in tut-install/javaeetutorial5/examples/ejb/confirmer/dist, and deploys this EAR file to your Application Server instance.

Building, Packaging, and Deploying confirmer Using Ant

To build and package the confirmer example, do the following:

1. In a terminal window, go to tut-install/examples/ejb/confirmer.

2. Enter the following command:

   ant

   This compiles the source code and creates an EAR file, confirmer.ear, in the dist directory.

To deploy confirmer.ear, type the following command in a terminal window:

ant deploy

Running the confirmer Client in NetBeans IDE

By default, the client sends a message to pig.bodine@example.com, a fictional email address. To change the email address in NetBeans IDE, do the following:

1. Right-click the confirmer project in the Projects pane and select Properties.

2. Click the Run category.

3. In the Client Information area, under Arguments, enter the email address to which you want the message sent.

4. Click OK.

To run the client in NetBeans IDE, right-click the confirmer project in the Projects pane and select Run. You should see the following line when the client has successfully sent the test message:

...
Message sent to pig.bodine@example.com.
...

Running the confirmer Client Using Ant

By default, the client sends a message to pig.bodine@example.com, a fictional email address. To change the email address, set the app-client.args property in tut-install/examples/ejb/confirmer/nbproject/project.properties to the email address to which you’d like the test message sent. For example:

app-client.args=duke@example.com

To retrieve the client JAR and run the client, enter the following command in a terminal:

ant run

You should see the following line when the client has successfully sent the test message:

[exec] Message sent to pig.bodine@example.com.

If you changed the target email address, the test message should arrive in the user’s inbox in a few moments.