Red Hat OpenShift Continues to Innovate for Enterprise Java Developers Looking to Leverage the Power of the Cloud

Among the many development languages Red Hat’s OpenShift Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS) supports for developers, Java remains the most popular. As the OpenShift PaaS platform continues to expand and innovate, the improvements for its lifecycle support for Java continue to accelerate as well. Over the past year, Red Hat has brought several new capabilities to OpenShift for Java developers, explored below.

In August 2011, we announced that OpenShift PaaS was introducing support for Java Enterprise Edition (EE) 6 application servers, which forms the basis for JBoss Enterprise Application Platform. With that integration and support, OpenShift became the first PaaS at the time to deliver Java EE 6 to cloud developers. In November of 2011, we followed that announcement up with news that OpenShift was integrating Jenkins, JBoss Tools and Maven technologies to allow Java developers to code, build, deploy and scale – a full Java lifecycle – even more easily in the cloud.

Today, Red Hat provides an update on new advancements for OpenShift Java developers. Here’s a rundown of the latest:

• Freedom from lock-in: OpenShift Origin is the open source project that powers the OpenShift service. Besides knowing that Java applications that run on OpenShift will run on a developer’s laptop, datacenter or OpenShift service without modification, users can also build their own PaaS to host their Java applications using their own hardware or a cloud provider’s infrastructure. This means that Java developers won't get locked-in and their code will remain portable across runtime environments.

• Support for additional Java application servers: OpenShift gives developers a broad range of choice when it comes to application servers. OpenShift natively supports JBoss Enterprise Application Platform 6 and JBoss Application Server 7, while it can also be extended to support applications written for Tomcat or GlassFish.

• Ability to hot-deploy applications: Java applications deployed to OpenShift can also be “hot deployed,” meaning you can push application changes without having to restart the application server, which can translate into better uptimes and uninterrupted service for end users.

• JBoss Tools update: With the release of JBoss Tools 3.3, Java developers have complete access to all the functionality the OpenShift API offers. This makes developing, deploying and managing Java applications in the cloud an integrated experience.

• Compatibility for Google App Engine applications: Developers who have wanted to migrate their applications off Google App Engine in the past, but have not been able to because of the costs associated with rewriting their code, can now run the same apps on top of JBoss Application Server 7 and OpenShift by employing the JBoss Cape Dwarf extension.

In summary, OpenShift is committed to continuous improvement of its Java development experience and we feel that it provides the best platform for Java development in the cloud today.

To learn more about OpenShift, sign up and deploy your first app in minutes, visit: https://openshift.redhat.com.