Java Chapter 1. Introduction

Welcome to Enterprise Java Programming with IBM WebSphere, 2nd Edition. This book was designed to help you understand how to design, build, and deploy applications based on the Java 2 Enterprise Edition (J2EE) using the IBM WebSphere family of tools and runtime. This book was written for technical managers seeking guidance in understanding J2EE and WebSphere; architects who wish to design scalable, secure enterprise applications; and for the day-to-day developer who wishes to create more robust, consistent code.
You'll find our approach to be a bit different than other books. Rather than simply focusing on the bits and bytes of each technology component that makes up WebSphere, we take a slightly broader view. We will show you how J2EE and WebSphere combine to form an architecture and runtime suitable for large, mission-critical applications.
If you have already invested in the award-winning WebSphere Studio family of tools, or you are considering doing so, this book will ensure that you get the maximum productivity benefits WebSphere has to offer. Through hands-on examples, we will illustrate how the IBM WebSphere Studio family of tools helps you master enterprise application development. These examples will also demonstrate some of the J2EE best practices which are intended to make your development tasks easier, your code more maintainable, and your enterprise projects successful. Along the way, we will also provide rationale for our approaches to building enterprise applications. We will start by discussing the importance of enterprise development, explaining the development process, and presenting the topology of properly layered enterprise applications.