Azure Container Instances allow you to rapidly deploy containers to the Microsoft Azure cloud without having to manage virtual machines and the corresponding infrastructure. Container Instances can be used to rapidly deploy Java EE and MicroProfile applications using Payara Micro as the underlying platform for your Cloud Native applications.

The Payara Platform is perfect for deploying Jakarta EE and MicroProfile applications on Microsoft Azure. One rapid option for deploying on Azure is to use Azure Application Services, especially Web App for Containers. The WebApp for Containers service allows you to rapidly deploy production Payara Micro applications onto Azure in seconds, allowing both rapid horizontal and vertical scaling on demand.

Recently I was tasked with preparing a presentation on an update to Jakarta EE and Eclipse MicroProfile® and it got me thinking about the organisation and structure involved in this huge effort to transform Java EE into a truly open source standard under the Eclipse Foundation. While organising my thoughts I put together a picture showing the structure and tensions of this undertaking to help people understand what various groups do and perhaps how better to get involved. The structure and governance is evolving as I write this so I may not get everything right. 

In Payara Server 5 we have introduced the concept of a Deployment Group - in this blog post, we'll explore why they are important and what they are used for.

We are very excited about the upcoming release of Payara Platform 5! With the new Data Grid, MicroProfile 1.2 support and incorporation of the Java EE 8 reference implementations it is shaping up to be a great release. 

With the release imminent, I thought now is a good time to let people know about some of the changes taking place in Payara Release Streams and Development, and how this affects both customers and users of the community version of Payara.

There have been a lot of really great updates coming out of the EE4J project recently and as far as I can see, the project is progressing nicely given the size and complexity of the undertaking.

In Payara Server 5 we will be introducing some major changes to the way clustering is working by creating the Domain Data Grid (see documentation for more info). The Domain Data Grid will be easier to use, more scalable, more flexible and ideally suited for cloud environments and cloud-native architectures. All Payara Server instances will join a single domain-wide data grid for sharing of in-memory data like web sessions, JCache, SSO and Stateful EJBs. 

As we are at the start of a New Year and it is traditional to gather your thoughts and put in place New Year resolutions and plans, I thought I would share with our Community and Customers the plans for Payara in 2018.

Back in June we announced MicroProfile with RedHat, IBM, Tomitribe, LJC and SouJava and Microprofile.io was launched as a location for community collaboration on Enterprise Java Microservices. In the announcement each of the vendors promised to have a MicroProfile runtime ready and available in time for JavaOne. Well  after much beavering away here in the Payara Engineering team we have just pushed onto Maven Central our 1.0 release of Payara MicroProfile.

The new Java Magazine is out now, featuring a lot of useful articles about enterprise Java - not so much Java EE as a platform, but individual services that can be useful as part of a larger solution. See below for an introduction to my article on Custom Servlet Authentication Using JASPIC, also featured in the magazine.