Web 2.0 Scaled Out Reference App...

It has struck me that not many good, scaled out, start to finish, Open Source Java reference applications exist for developers to learn from. Something that can demonstrate a modern and diverse stack of software handling large amounts of users.

Well check out the Examinator Web Reference App. It's goal is to demonstrate and document everything from "Build and test" to "Deployment" for a high scale, realistic, web application. It strives to be well written and as simple as possible while still being a good demonstration of best practices. It also strives to document all the relivant pieces so others can learn from it. This is quite a challenge and I'm sure dissagreement will exist on some of the choices. I think it's an excellent start and the right set of goals.

Here is a taste of the stack and tools:

• Spring Webflow
• Spring MVC
• Sitemesh
• Spring
• Spring Security
• Freemarker
• Terracotta
• JPA
• Hibernate
• Apache DBCP
• MySQL
• Apache mod_proxy
• Tomcat
• Jetty
• Maven
• Eclipse (+WTP)
• Cargo
• JUnit
• HttpUnit
• Selenium
• Crosscheck

Click here to learn more about the choices and why they were made.

It's pretty good now and I'm pretty sure it's going to get better and better over time so check in early and often. I hope others can learn as much from reading about it and hacking on it as we did writing it.