Tag Archives: developers

WebSphere MQ and Ubuntu (and other developer resources)

Posted on September 12, 2011 | 3 Comments

For some time now, I’ve been using Ubuntu as my desktop operating system. Although I’m yet to be convinced by Unity (it’s getting there, the more I learn the shortcuts and stick with it), I do know that Ubuntu is a hugely-popular platform for developers – and I know that many of my colleagues at IBM who are in development roles choose our internal Linux-based client options (which cover a range of distributions), instead of Windows or OS X.

So, what about developing with or using WebSphere MQ on Ubuntu? Well, the officially-supported platforms for WebSphere MQ V7.0.x don’t include Ubuntu – that’s primarily a combination of the relative popularity of RedHat or SuSE Enterprise platforms in production deployments, time and resource spent on testing, and the fact that it would probably only be practical to test and support it on a Long Term Support release if it ever became supported.

However, it is possible to get WMQ installed and running on Ubuntu without jumping through too many hoops. The primary stumbling block is that the software is packaged in RPM format rather than in Debian/Ubuntu-friendly DEB files. One piece of advice is to avoid any guides that suggest converting the packages using alien… it may seem unusual, but you’re likely to find it far easier to get it working by installing rpm on the system instead. My colleague Rob Convery has posted a couple of very useful blog entries on this subject which I’d recommend if you have a need to get yourself running on Ubuntu – again, bearing in mind that it is not an officially supported platform, and that should you encounter issues then it might be necessary to reproduce them under RHEL or SLES when raising a service call with IBM.

 

There are other ways to get to use and learn about WMQ too, of course – for example, you could grab one of the IBM Industry Application Platform cloud images to run on the IBM SmartCloud or Amazon EC2 (containing WAS V7, DB2 Express-C 9.7, and WMQ V7.0.1, running on SLES), or you can try a number of the WMQ family products in IBM’s SOA Sandbox, (including WMQ File Transfer Edition, and WMQ Advanced Message Security). You can also check out the MQonTV YouTube channel. Let me know what you think!

→ 3 Comments

Posted in blog

Tagged , , , , , , , , ,

What a week for MQTT!

Posted on August 15, 2011 | 1 Comment

Part of my role as WebSphere Messaging Community Lead involves IBM’s MQ Telemetry Transport protocol. I spend a chunk of my time talking about how MQTT relates to building a Smarter Planet, and explaining how it can be used to build some very cool new applications and solutions.

MQTT logoFolks from IBM and Eurotech may have jointly authored MQTT, but it has been published online with terms enabling royalty-free use and implementation of the protocol. The next stage is to put it forward for standardisation. Last Friday, the call for participation in a standards discussion was published on mqtt.org. It’s open to anyone to join, and given the excitement I’ve personally seen in the developer community, I’m hopeful that we’ll see plenty of interest.

Friday saw even more big news, from an entirely unexpected source. As I stood chatting to people arriving at the OggCamp party that evening, my Twitter alerts and email went crazy with MQTT chatter… Facebook announced that their new Facebook Messenger application (a result of their acquisition of the Beluga team earlier in the year) uses MQTT! I’d been aware of different mobile app developers using MQTT for a while now – in fact we recently highlighted what a great match the protocol is for Android applications, on the mqtt.org blog – but had not known about Facebook’s interest or usage. In their post talking about how Facebook Messenger works, they call out the characteristics that make it a strong protocol for a mobile group messaging application – low bandwidth, low overheads, low power cost… all of the things that have made MQTT successful in sensor networks and solutions, make it ideal for these kind of applications as well.

Well… as I said, a big week, with some exciting news. So it seemed only right that I should give a talk about MQTT and all of these latest developments at OggCamp this past weekend – the event which three years ago, resulted in Roger Light creating his mosquitto broker.

You may recognise the slides as a remix of the talk I gave at LinuxConf in January, but I’ve updated them to highlight the OggCamp dimension and to talk about the recent news. There will be more to come during the coming weeks, so join the chat in channel #mqtt on Freenode IRC, and keep an eye on mqtt.org!

 

→ 1 Comment

Posted in blog

Tagged , , , , , , , ,

IMPACT 2011 – and the Unconference

Posted on April 4, 2011 | Leave a comment

This week is the last before I hop on a plane a head over to The Venetian in Las Vegas for this year’s IBM IMPACT conference. I’ve been privileged to attend the last few of these customer and user conferences, and I’m always happy to have the opportunity to meet users and techies, as well as to talk to new folks about what is happening in the WebSphere Messaging portfolio.

IMPACT 2011 banner

This year I’ve been given the task of talking about what’s new in WebSphere MQ (hint: if you look at the whole WMQ family, there is a lot going on); and to talk about our Smarter Planet protocol, also known as MQ Telemetry Transport.

As before, we have a social aggregator where you can follow the conference. One particularly exciting addition this year is the idea that we’ll run an unconference within IMPACT itself, and we’ve carved out the Thursday in order to do so. If you’ve never been to an unconference before, the concept is that the organisers put up the venue, framework, and support, and the attendees build up the actual agenda. The call for participation is open now… if you are really a techie or an architect and don’t want to be bored by the business-oriented stuff, you need to be at the unconference. It’s for developers, by developers (actually – that’s YOU).

WebSphere Unconference

The ideas will be posted at Impact 2011 April 11-13 using the wall grid posted onsite, where you can continue to submit and vote on ideas. The Unconference is held on April 14th from morning through afternoon. Sessions will run about 1 hour with several rooms open during each time block. The kick-off is at 8:30AM with a special guest speaker. The format of sessions is up to speaker(s) to decide – go solo, pair up or make a roundtable with a group. Make it your own.

There’s a slightly different way of doing things here, as instead of only having folks nominate themselves to present on the day, we’ve got a forum where you can suggest and vote on topics right now.

If you don’t believe that this thing is going to be “the place to be” on the Thursday of IMPACT, here’s what I actually consider the second best part (apart from the conversations with developers themselves): RedMonk. The guys are going to be all over the Unconference, including a keynote by James Governor, and a breakout session with Stephen O’Grady. Listen to @monkchips:

James Governor: Developers should be excited. The pendulum is swinging back… you are the new kingmakers, so what are you going to do about it?

For more on the unconference, you need to be following Ryan Boyles and Kathleen Holm. Oh, and if you’re coming to IMPACT, and you use Twitter, give Lanyrd a try – it’s a great way of sharing what you’re up to.

→ Leave a comment

Posted in blog

Tagged , , , , , , , , , , ,

IBM WebSphere Application Server – free to developers

Posted on June 19, 2009 | Leave a comment

My friend Per and the guys who write the WebSphere Community Blog have already posted today to note that developers can now download and use WebSphere Application Server version 7.0 for free.

Nada. Zilch. Zip. Nuthin’. Nowt.

What’s the big deal? Well, before now IBM hasn’t made WebSphere Application Server (also known as WAS) available for free, you’ve needed a license. Although the Java Enterprise Edition programming model is broadly the same regardless of the choice of vendor, it’s always a good idea to develop, test and deploy on the same version of the runtime you’ll be using in production. Plus, you get the opportunity to learn more about WAS administration and hone skills with the product. It’s well worth a look.

And look, let’s be honest, I don’t post about WebSphere stuff half as much as I “should” – this is newsworthy stuff. Go take a look.

→ Leave a comment

Posted in 24924

Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , ,