JBoss Enterprise Application Platform Migration Guidelines

After realizing the value that JBoss provides and making the decision to migrate one or more Java Enterprise Edition applications to the JBoss Enterprise Application Platform, the next step to lowering the total cost of ownership within an IT organization is to take the proper planning steps. While the detailed steps involved in an application migration to JBoss vary from one application to the next, the evaluation process and high-level migration strategy is a very repeatable process. Being familiar with this process can save significant time, effort, and money during the migration effort.
The following sections detail the various planning steps and migration factors to consider throughout the migration effort.
Migration Planning
The first step to a successful JBoss migration is to plan the migration. To begin the planning effort, it is necessary to take a complete inventory of the current systems to understand the application environment, its dependencies, and all baseline requirements that must be replicated to the new environment. Having an inventory of the current system and architecture will ensure the proper components are incorporated into the new platform and that hardware is procured to support the application with optimal performance where necessary. In general, JBoss Enterprise Application Platform will perform as well or better than competing application platforms on identical hardware, making hardware sizing decisions related to a migration a matter of scaling to future needs rather than current requirements.
The following planning steps create a solid foundation for understanding the full scope of the migration effort. These steps promote proper transparency and allow proper expectations to be set with the business and IT stakeholders. As a side benefit, this exercise will lay the foundation for a comprehensive governance model and plan that is a requirement of any proper SOA or BPM architecture.
At the conclusion of the Migration Planning phase, the roles, resources and total cost of the project will be clearly identified. This detailed level of planning will ensure the execution of the migration is completed seamlessly.
Migration Execution
With the Migration Plan fully documented and communicated successfully to stakeholders, the migration of the environment can begin. Based on the results of the analysis of the current implementation, the execution process timeline and path can vary widely. However, while each migration is unique, the migration of the core system will typically follow a standard approach. This section of the document will identify these common core tasks that will be performed in nearly every migration effort, as well as some of the variances that will be encountered and how to work them into the overall migration plan.
Standard JBoss Migration Tasks
With a solid migration plan in place, the execution of migrating the core environment becomes more predictable.
Enhancements
Many times, going through the process of migrating an application to JBoss that was developed years ago on another platform presents the perfect opportunity to do a necessary house cleaning on the application. Upgrading components or libraries to more recent versions, updating the build process to be more streamlined and manageable, making an architectural change such as incorporating Hibernate to perform data access, and many other such modifications can be addressed as part of the upgrade process. Amentra specializes in all facets of this process and is available to help identify the advantages of enhancement opportunities and help the client evaluate the total cost of ownership of the complete migration effort.