Tomcat Training

The Tomcat Training from JBoss is targeted at web tier J2EE developers who wish to become experts with the Tomcat Servlet container. This is a 2 day class, with 55% spent on theory and 45% on labs.

Various topics will be covered in this training, including Tomcat architecture, best practices. You will learn how to embed Tomcat. A large portion of the training and labs are designed to give you hands-on experience with using the native connectors which can be used to integrate Tomcat and JBoss inside your existing web server infrastructure.

Course Modules

1. General overview
   High level presentation of Tomcat, basics about Tomcat inside JBoss, presentation of the mod_jk native connector.
2. Tomcat architecture
   Details about the Tomcat architecture, including high level presentation of all the various Tomcat components, class loading inside Tomcat.
3. Advanced Servlet & JSP
   This is a presentation of little known advanced features of the Servlet 2.4 and JSP 2.0 APIs. Note that this does not include any basics. The labs cover using some advanced JSP 2.0 features, as well as experimenting with Servlet filters.
4. Tomcat Connectors, Containers and Valves
   This section presents the various components available in Tomcat. This covers the various valves which are available in Tomcat (access logging, SSO) and the connectors. The lab will cover writing a custom valve for Tomcat.
5. Tomcat Best Practices
   This covers many topics, including programming techniques, how to use the web application deployer, production configurations for Tomcat, etc. The lab will cover using the Tomcat deployer tool, and doing hands on configuration on an out of the box Tomcat installation.
6. Native web server integration
   All about mod_jk 1.2 and mod_proxy from Apache 2.2. The labs will cover using mod_jk with Apache, including compiling for students with appropriate compilation tools, using mod_proxy with Apache 2.2, and a demo on using mod_jk with IIS.
7. Introduction to Embedded Tomcat and JBossWeb
   This section covers the various embedded options which are available with Tomcat, and how JBoss is using Embedded Tomcat. Using the Tomcat connectors directly is also covered.
8. JBossWeb clustering and HttpSession replication
   This section details web tier clustering inside JBoss, its configuration options, clustering setup, and the influence of clustering on web application design. The labs cover using the various native connectors to setup a HTTP load balancer over two JBoss instances.
9. JBossWeb security and SSO
   This presents the security inside JBoss, including JAAS, an overview of JACC, and the security services which are provided to web applications. The section also details using single sign on with your applications, with or without clustering.
10. JBossWeb Best Practices
    This section covers various configuration tips, possible deployment issues, etc, all specifically related to Tomcat inside JBoss.