2007 09 19

I am currently working on an open source project (do not ask me which since it will surface soon, and I should not talk much about it till it does ;)) that required to provide web access to apps, services, and contents. From my days fighting with Mulgara descriptors I remembered that Jetty (full-featured web server implemented entirely in Java) could be embedded into applications to provide such services. It has been two months now since I started using, and it is a nice, shiny, and slick piece of software. I used Tomcat for most of my stuff, but Jetty is definitely and amazing alternative Below I just pasted one of the ways you can embed Jetty in your app.

Server server = new Server(8080);
Context root = new Context(server,"/",Context.SESSIONS);
root.addServlet(new ServletHolder(new HelloServlet("Hello World!")), "/*");
server.start();
server.join();

Yes, that’s it. You can also embed full-fledge multiple web apps using

Server server = new Server();
XmlConfiguration configuration = new XmlConfiguration(new File("myJetty.xml").toURL()); //or use new XmlConfiguration(new FileInputStream("myJetty.xml"));
configuration.configure(server);
server.start();
server.join();

Oh, and one last cool thing. You can remove apps from the server without needing to restart it! That is pretty useful.

2007 09 05

I am sitting at the workshop on the Engineer of the Future hosted at NCSA. The workshop is part of the ETSI lecture series organized by Michael Loui and David E. Goldberg. The talks so far are very interesting. Hard to highlight all the relevant points, but I would like to mention the experience Sherra E. Kerns is sharing about their experience at Olin College. The engagement with the curriculum that students show is very remarkable. She mentioned current established curricula tend to kill innovation (and engagement). That comment resonate with my personal experience freshmen was always more rewarding and challenging than last year students.