EnterpriseJavaBeans, Fourth Edition, is the definitive guide to EJB 2.1. It shows you how to build complex, mission-critical systems using snap-together software components that model business objects and processes. EJB 2.1 makes several important steps forward in EJB technology: message-driven beans are much more flexible, a time service has been added, and EJBs have been integrated with web services.

Enterprise JavaBeans delivers on a promise that was astonishing a few years ago: not only can EJBs run without modification on any operating system, they can run on any J2EE application server. However, after writing EJBs, you have to deploy them in an application server, and deploying EJBs can be a painful task. This edition includes the JBoss Workbook, which shows you how to deploy the examples on the open source JBoss Application Server.

This fourth edition covers:

• EJB 2.1 and 2.0
• Entity beans, including container-managed persistence (CMP) and the EJB Query Language (EJB-QL)
• Message-driven beans, session beans, and EJBs as web service endpoints
• XML deployment descriptors
• Transaction management and security
• Deploying EJBs on the JBoss 4.0 application server.
• Practical advice on designing and building EJB applications

If you've done any enterprise software development in the past few years, you already know the extent to which EJB has changed the field. Use this book to catch up on the latest developments. If you're new to enterprise software development, or if you haven't been working with EJB, this book will bring you up to speed on this exciting technology for building business systems.