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Hello Mike, All,

Users click on a link on our website and Java Webstart selects the
appropriate binary among three options: Windows, Mac and Linux.

We have a person responsible for deployment (Fei Gao) who has been
doing this for years and I am assuming she is on top of it.

Meanwhile, I developed a stand-alone application (SyBiL) that uses
libSBML and deployed it myself on our website, also using Java
Webstart. You need to have binaries for Win, Mac and Linux in the same
version you use for development. If the application needs access to
the file system (ours do), all JAR files need to be signed.

In principle, it is not hard to do. In practical terms, it can be
painful, because you either redeploy (upload to webspace and download
again with your browser) all files together, which can take time if
your application is large, or you try to redeploy only the files that
need updating and easily pick the wrong ones. If you fail to suppress
caching, this can create artificial version conflicts and other
irreproducible behaviour.

Of course, if you are willing to invest the work, you can do things
like set up a local webspace on the same computer you use for
development, or set up some clever automatation.

And, of course, this requires that three binaries are enough to
cover all users you intend to have, and that you have the means to
test deployment of every one of them. Maybe true these days, but who
knows how that will be in the future.

Take care
Oliver

On Mon, May 18, 2009 at 6:13 PM, Michael Hucka <mhucka@caltech.edu> wrote:
> So, here's a question for you.  The Virtual Cell group has
> (I imagine) one of the biggest Java code bases -- so what
> happens now, with the current native binary version of
> libSBML?  How much trouble has it been to use in VCell?
>
> MH
>
>>>>>> On 18 May 2009, Oliver Ruebenacker <curoli@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>  curoli> Have you ever tried to deploy across different
>  curoli> platforms?
>  curoli>
>  curoli> A pure Java version can easily be deployed across
>  curoli> platforms without change (ideally). However, if
>  curoli> you depend on binaries, you need to provide
>  curoli> different ones for each platform. If a system
>  curoli> already has the binary installed but in a version
>  curoli> incompatible with your software, then you have a
>  curoli> problem. You can still run it in a cage such as
>  curoli> with Java Webstart, but that is infinitely harder
>  curoli> to deploy and debug than just putting a pure Java
>  curoli> application in a JAR for download.
>  curoli>
>  curoli> The JNI approach also prevents you from avoiding
>  curoli> redundancies, for example, libSBML needs native
>  curoli> XML support, and your application may need Java
>  curoli> XML support in addition to that.
>  curoli>
>  curoli> Take care Oliver
>
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--
Oliver Ruebenacker, Computational Cell Biologist
BioPAX Integration at Virtual Cell (http://vcell.org/biopax)
Center for Cell Analysis and Modeling
http://www.oliver.curiousworld.org
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