- Introduction
- The J2EE Platform
- The J2EE APIs
- Java Connector Architecture (JCA)
- Java Message Service (JMS)
- Harris Kern's Enterprise Computing Institute
Java Connector Architecture (JCA)
The Java Connector Architecture (JCA) defines a platform-independent interface to deal with enterprise systems such as enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems and mainframe systems, which JCA calls enterprise information systems (EISs). To facilitate integration, the JCA defines a set of APIS called contracts. There are two different types of contracts:
A system-level contract between an application server and a resource adapter
An application-level contract between an application component and a resource adapter
The advantages to the three parties (EIS vendor, application server vendor, and application developer) are as follows:
EIS vendor: This facilitates integration; instead of providing a resource adapter for each J2EE-compliant application server (BEA WebLogic, IBM WebSphere, and so on), the vendor can provide a single resource adapter that can be plugged into any application server, provided that the application server is J2EE-compliant. The resource adapter is a system-level software library provided by the EIS vendor, and is accessed by the application server to connect (and manipulate) the EIS. In many ways, a JCA resource adapter is similar to a JDBC driver. In fact, a JDBC driver can be thought of a specific example of a resource adapter, one that works specifically with relational databases.
Application server vendor: Each application server can now support multiple EISs, regardless of the EIS vendor.
Application developer: Instead of learning the idiosyncrasies of each EIS, the application can interface with the EIS through a consistent APIthe Common Client Interface (CCI)rather than multiple APIs.
While it might seem that the JCA would not be needed with the emergence of web services, the reality is that many EISs can only be connected through special adapters because they haven't been (and may never be) accessible through web services. Thus, for the foreseeable future, JCA and web services will coexist. JCA provides the "last mile" integration to the legacy system.