Chapter 3. Enterprise JavaBeans Roles

The EJB architecture simplifies the development of complex business applications by viewing the development process in terms of the tasks that need to be performed. The architecture divides the EJB application development and deployment processes into distinct roles and gives each role a specific set of tasks. These roles address application development, infrastructure services, application assembly and integration, and deployment and administration issues.

We group these tasks by functionality, identifying six major functional areas, each responsible for a separate portion of the application development and deployment processes. To simplify things further, we can think of each functional area as a role. An individual can perform one or more roles within an enterprise or EJB application development environment. However, it is highly unlikely that one person would perform all six roles. More often, one or more individuals together may be responsible for just one role.

This chapter describes the six roles involved in the EJB application development and deployment processes:

• Bean developer

• Application assembler

• Deployer

• System administrator

• EJB container provider

• EJB server provider

In addition, this chapter describes the tool vendor roles that frequently come into play in an EJB enterprise environment.