Where is JBoss AS 5?

June 12th, 2008 Radim Marek Posted in jboss |

You know the story. By the end of 2005 JBoss was releasing information about the giant steps they plan to achieve with the release of next version of application server. The question now, almost three years later, is obvious - where is JBoss AS 5?

If you’re looking for short and positive answer, I will disappoint you. Personally, I can’t foresee release of the version 5.0 this year. It might sound as a tragedy, but reality is different. Ask yourself if you really have to wait? Is it application server you need? Because if your answer is positive, it’s usually better to use something you already have. Branch 4.x is now mature and stable. It might be missing bits and pieces, but frankly, it’s not something that would stop your development. With the release of AS 4.2 you also got all JEE 5 functionality we’ve been desperately waiting for.

To understand why I don’t think it’s important to wait is the fact JBoss is not the same company anymore. Look around and you will see great improvements. Application server is no longer fighting for it’s market share, that position has been already established. Focus has been shifted to other projects within the product suite. From the obvious re-implementation of JMS broker - Messaging, jBPM, excellent rule engine - Drools, transaction engine, Seam, Eclipse Tools and many more. You still think nothing has changed?

From what I can say, changes are present through-out the middleware suite. Especially now when the Enterprise Application Platform 4.3 is available, with necessary commercial backing, updated training materials and large user community represented by all of us who are already using community versions of the products. Individual products now can get updated version - that’s just matter of time, but more important is consistent support and platform in general.

So no matter when JBoss AS 5 will be released, great things are already happening. We all started using only Hibernate or application server, and as our solutions are getting bigger, so does JBoss.

More information about individual project can be found at http://www.jboss.org/projects/