Let's look at an example of how to use JBoss Cache in a standalone (i.e. outside an application server) fashion with dummy transactions:

Properties prop = new Properties();
prop.put(Context.INITIAL_CONTEXT_FACTORY, "org.jboss.cache.transaction.DummyContextFactory");
User Transaction tx=(UserTransaction)new InitialContext(prop).lookup("UserTransaction");
TreeCache tree = new TreeCache();
PropertyConfigurator config = new PropertyConfigurator();
config.configure(tree, "META-INF/replSync-service.xml");
tree.createService(); // not necessary
tree.startService(); // kick start tree cache

try {
   tx.begin();
   tree.put("/classes/cs-101", "description", "the basics");
   tree.put("/classes/cs-101", "teacher", "Ben");
   tx.commit();
}
catch(Throwable ex) {
   try { tx.rollback(); } catch(Throwable t) {}
}

The first lines obtain a user transaction using the 'JEE way' via JNDI. Note that we could also say

UserTransaction tx = new DummyUserTransaction(DummyTransactionManager.getInstance());

Then we create a new TreeCache and configure it using a PropertyConfigurator class and a configuration XML file (see below for a list of all configuration options).

Next we start the cache. Then, we start a transaction (and associate it with the current thread internally). Any methods invoked on the cache will now be collected and only applied when the transaction is committed. In the above case, we create a node "/classes/cs-101" and add 2 elements to its map. Assuming that the cache is configured to use synchronous replication, on transaction commit the modifications are replicated. If there is an exception in the methods (e.g. lock acquisition failed), or in the two-phase commit protocol applying the modifications to all nodes in the cluster, the transaction is rolled back.