TOTD #166: Using NoSQL database in your Java EE 6 Applications on GlassFish - MongoDB for now!
- by arungupta
The Java EE 6 platform includes Java Persistence API to work with
RDBMS. The JPA specification defines a comprehensive API that includes,
but not restricted to, how a database table can be mapped to a POJO and
vice versa, provides mechanisms how a PersistenceContext can be
injected in a @Stateless bean and then be used for performing different
operations on the database table and write typesafe queries. There are
several well known advantages of RDBMS but the NoSQL movement has
gained traction over past couple of years. The NoSQL databases
are not intended to be a replacement for the mainstream RDBMS. As Philosophy
of NoSQL explains, NoSQL database was designed for casual use where
all the features typically provided by an RDBMS are not required. The
name "NoSQL" is more of a category of databases that is more known for
what it is not rather than what it is. The basic principles of NoSQL database are:
No
need to have a pre-defined schema and that makes them a
schema-less database. Addition of new properties to existing
objects is easy and does not require ALTER TABLE. The unstructured data
gives flexibility to
change the format of data any time without downtime or reduced service
levels. Also there are no joins happening on the server because there
is no structure and thus no relation between them.
Scalability and performance is more important than the entire set
of functionality typically
provided by an RDBMS. This set of databases provide eventual
consistency and/or transactions restricted to single
items but more focus on CRUD.
Not be restricted to SQL to access the information stored in the
backing database.
Designed to scale-out (horizontal) instead of scale-up
(vertical). This
is important knowing
that databases, and everything else as well, is moving into the cloud.
RBDMS can scale-out using sharding but requires complex management and
not for the faint of heart.
Unlike RBDMS which require a separate caching tier, most of the
NoSQL databases comes with integrated caching.
Designed for less management and simpler data models lead to
lower administration as well.
There are primarily three types of NoSQL databases:
Key-Value stores (e.g. Cassandra and Riak)
Document databases (MongoDB or CouchDB)
Graph databases (Neo4J)
You may think NoSQL is panacea but as I mentioned above they are not
meant to replace the mainstream databases and here is why:
RDBMS have been around for many years, very stable, and
functionally rich. This is something CIOs and CTOs can bet their money
on without much worry. There is a reason 98% of Fortune 100 companies
run Oracle :-) NoSQL is cutting edge, brings excitement to developers,
but enterprises are cautious about them.
Commercial databases like Oracle are well supported by the
backing enterprises in terms of providing support resources on a global
scale. There is a full ecosystem built around these commercial
databases
providing training, performance tuning, architecture guidance, and
everything else. NoSQL is fairly new and typically backed by a single
company not able to meet the scale of these big enterprises.
NoSQL databases are good for CRUDing operations but business
intelligence is extremely important for enterprises to stay
competitive. RDBMS provide extensive tooling to generate this data but
that was not the original intention of NoSQL databases and is lacking
in that area. Generating any meaningful information other than CRUDing
require extensive programming.
Not suited for complex transactions such as banking systems or
other highly transactional applications requiring 2-phase commit.
SQL cannot be used with NoSQL databases and writing simple
queries can be involving.
Enough talking, lets take a look at some code.
This blog has published
multiple blogs on how to access a RDBMS using JPA in a Java EE 6
application. This Tip Of The
Day (TOTD) will show you can
use MongoDB (a document-oriented database) with a typical 3-tier Java
EE 6 application.
Lets get started! The complete source code of this project can be downloaded here.
Download MongoDB for your platform from here (1.8.2 as of
this writing) and start
the server as:
arun@ArunUbuntu:~/tools/mongodb-linux-x86_64-1.8.2/bin$./mongod./mongod --help for help and startup optionsSun Jun 26 20:41:11 [initandlisten] MongoDB starting : pid=11210port=27017 dbpath=/data/db/ 64-bit Sun Jun 26 20:41:11 [initandlisten] db version v1.8.2, pdfile version4.5Sun Jun 26 20:41:11 [initandlisten] git version:433bbaa14aaba6860da15bd4de8edf600f56501bSun Jun 26 20:41:11 [initandlisten] build sys info: Linuxbs-linux64.10gen.cc 2.6.21.7-2.ec2.v1.2.fc8xen #1 SMP Fri Nov 2017:48:28 EST 2009 x86_64 BOOST_LIB_VERSION=1_41Sun Jun 26 20:41:11 [initandlisten] waiting for connections on port 27017Sun Jun 26 20:41:11 [websvr] web admin interface listening on port 28017
The default directory for the database is /data/db and needs to be
created as:
sudo mkdir -p /data/db/sudo chown `id -u` /data/db
You can specify a different directory using "--dbpath" option. Refer to
Quickstart
for your specific platform.
Using NetBeans, create a Java EE 6 project and make sure to
enable
CDI and add JavaServer Faces framework.
Download MongoDB
Java Driver (2.6.3 of this writing) and add it to the project
library by
selecting "Properties", "LIbraries", "Add Library...", creating a new
library by specifying the location of the JAR file, and adding the
library to the created project.
Edit the generated "index.xhtml" such that it looks like:
<h1>Add a new movie</h1><h:form> Name: <h:inputText value="#{movie.name}" size="20"/><br/> Year: <h:inputText value="#{movie.year}" size="6"/><br/> Language: <h:inputText value="#{movie.language}" size="20"/><br/> <h:commandButton actionListener="#{movieSessionBean.createMovie}" action="show" title="Add" value="submit"/></h:form>
This page has a simple HTML form with three text boxes and a submit
button. The text boxes take name, year, and language of a movie and the
submit button invokes the "createMovie" method of "movieSessionBean"
and then render "show.xhtml".
Create "show.xhtml" ("New" -> "Other..." -> "Other" ->
"XHTML File") such that it looks like:
<head> <title><h1>List of movies</h1></title> </head> <body> <h:form> <h:dataTable value="#{movieSessionBean.movies}" var="m" > <h:column><f:facet name="header">Name</f:facet>#{m.name}</h:column> <h:column><f:facet name="header">Year</f:facet>#{m.year}</h:column> <h:column><f:facet name="header">Language</f:facet>#{m.language}</h:column> </h:dataTable> </h:form>
This page shows the name, year, and language of all movies stored in
the
database so far. The list of movies is returned by
"movieSessionBean.movies"
property.
Now create the "Movie" class such that it looks like:
import com.mongodb.BasicDBObject;import com.mongodb.BasicDBObject;import com.mongodb.DBObject;import javax.enterprise.inject.Model;import javax.validation.constraints.Size;/** * @author arun */@Modelpublic class Movie { @Size(min=1, max=20) private String name; @Size(min=1, max=20) private String language; private int year; // getters and setters for "name", "year", "language" public BasicDBObject toDBObject() { BasicDBObject doc = new BasicDBObject(); doc.put("name", name); doc.put("year", year); doc.put("language", language); return doc; } public static Movie fromDBObject(DBObject doc) { Movie m = new Movie(); m.name = (String)doc.get("name"); m.year = (int)doc.get("year"); m.language = (String)doc.get("language"); return m; } @Override public String toString() { return name + ", " + year + ", " + language; }}
Other than the usual boilerplate code, the key methods here are
"toDBObject" and "fromDBObject". These methods provide a conversion
from "Movie" -> "DBObject" and vice versa. The "DBObject" is a
MongoDB class that comes as part of the mongo-2.6.3.jar file and which
we added to our project earlier. The complete javadoc for 2.6.3
can be seen here.
Notice, this class also uses Bean Validation constraints and will be
honored by the JSF layer.
Finally, create "MovieSessionBean" stateless EJB with all the
business logic such that it
looks like:
package org.glassfish.samples;import com.mongodb.BasicDBObject;import com.mongodb.DB;import com.mongodb.DBCollection;import com.mongodb.DBCursor;import com.mongodb.DBObject;import com.mongodb.Mongo;import java.net.UnknownHostException;import java.util.ArrayList;import java.util.List;import javax.annotation.PostConstruct;import javax.ejb.Stateless;import javax.inject.Inject;import javax.inject.Named;/** * @author arun */@Stateless@Namedpublic class MovieSessionBean { @Inject Movie movie; DBCollection movieColl; @PostConstruct private void initDB() throws UnknownHostException { Mongo m = new Mongo(); DB db = m.getDB("movieDB"); movieColl = db.getCollection("movies"); if (movieColl == null) { movieColl = db.createCollection("movies", null); } } public void createMovie() { BasicDBObject doc = movie.toDBObject(); movieColl.insert(doc); } public List<Movie> getMovies() { List<Movie> movies = new ArrayList(); DBCursor cur = movieColl.find(); System.out.println("getMovies: Found " + cur.size() + " movie(s)"); for (DBObject dbo : cur.toArray()) { movies.add(Movie.fromDBObject(dbo)); } return movies; }}
The database is initialized in @PostConstruct. Instead of a working
with a database table, NoSQL databases work with a
schema-less document. The "Movie" class is the document in our case and
stored in the collection "movies". The collection allows us to perform
query functions on all movies. The "getMovies" method invokes "find"
method on the collection which is equivalent to the SQL query "select *
from movies" and then returns a List<Movie>.
Also notice that there is no "persistence.xml" in the project.
Right-click and run the project to see the output as:
Enter some values in the text box and click on enter to see the result
as:
If you reached here then you've successfully used MongoDB in your Java
EE 6 application, congratulations!
Some food for thought and further play ...
SQL
to MongoDB mapping shows mapping between traditional SQL ->
Mongo query language.
Tutorial
shows fun things you can do with MongoDB.
Try the interactive online
shell
The cookbook provides
common ways of using MongoDB
In terms of this project, here are some tasks that can be tried:
Encapsulate database management in a JPA persistence
provider. Is it even worth it because the capabilities are going to be
very different ?
MongoDB uses "BSonObject" class for JSON representation, add
@XmlRootElement on a POJO and how a compatible JSON representation can
be generated. This will make the fromXXX and toXXX methods redundant.
