Updating enterprise applications with the console

Updating enterprise applications consists of adding a new file or module to an installed Java™ Platform, Enterprise Edition (Java EE) application, or replacing or removing an installed application, file or module.

Before you begin

Before you update the application files on a server, ensure that the files are assembled in deployable modules.

Next, refer to Ways to update enterprise application files and decide how to update your application files. You can update enterprise applications or modules using the administrative console, the wsadmin tool, or Java MBean programming. These ways provide similar updating capabilities.

Further, ensure that the updated files can be installed to your deployment targets.

About this task

The steps describe how to update deployed applications or modules using the administrative console.

Procedure

  1. Back up the installed application or module.
    1. Go to the Enterprise applications page of the administrative console.

      Click Applications > Application Types > WebSphere enterprise applications in the console navigation tree.

    2. Export the application to an EAR file or export a file in the application.

      Select the application you want to export and click Export or Export File. Exporting preserves the binding information.

  2. With the application selected on the Enterprise applications page, click Update.
    The Preparing for application update page is displayed.
  3. Under Specify the EAR, WAR, JAR, RAR, or SAR module to upload and install:
    1. Ensure that Application to be updated refers to the application to be updated.
    2. Under Application update options, select the installed application, module, or file that you want to update.

      The online help Preparing for application update settings provides detailed information on the options.

      Avoid trouble: You cannot add, remove, or modify a Java Application Programming Interface (API) for XML-Based Web Services (JAX-WS) annotation using the Replace or add a single file or Replace, add, or delete multiple files update options. These options change a single file or a partial application. If you change a JAX-WS annotation using either of these options, the product does not return an error. However, you might encounter problems deploying annotated web services.
  4. If you selected the Replace the entire application or Replace or add a single module option:
    1. Click Next to display a wizard for updating application files.
    2. Complete the steps in the update wizard.

      This update wizard, which is similar to the installation wizard, provides fields for specifying or editing application binding information. Refer to information on installing applications using the console and on the Preparing for application installation binding settings page for guidance.

      Note that the installation steps have the merged binding information from the new version and the old version. If the new version has bindings for application artifacts such as Enterprise JavaBeans (EJB) Java Naming and Directory Interface (JNDI) names, EJB references or resource references, then those bindings will be part of the merged binding information. If new bindings are not present, then bindings are taken from the installed (old) version. If bindings are not present in the old version and if the default binding generation option is enabled, then the default bindings will be part of the merged binding information.

      You can select whether to ignore bindings in the old version or ones in the new version.

  5. Click Finish.
  6. If you did not use the Manage modules page of the update wizard, after updating the application, map the installed application or module to servers or clusters.

    Use the page accessed from the Enterprise applications page.

    1. Go to the Manage modules page.
      Click Applications > Application Types > WebSphere enterprise applications > application_name > Manage modules.
    2. Specify the application server where you want to install modules contained in your application and click OK.

      You can deploy Java 2 Platform, Enterprise Edition (J2EE) 1.4 modules to servers on Version 6 or later nodes. You can deploy Java Platform, Enterprise Edition (Java EE) 5 modules to servers on Version 7.x or later nodes. You can deploy Java EE 6 modules to servers on Version 8.x or later nodes.

      On multiple-server products, you can also deploy modules to clusters. To deploy J2EE 1.4 modules, the clusters must contain cluster members on Version 6 or later nodes. To deploy Java EE 5 modules, the clusters must contain cluster members on Version 7.x or later nodes. To deploy Java EE 6 modules, the clusters must contain cluster members on Version 8.x or later nodes.

Results

After replacement of a full application, the product uninstalls the old application. After replacement of a module, file or partial application, the product removes the old installed module, file or partial application from the installed application.

What to do next

After the application file or module installs successfully, do the following:

  1. If a changed application or module is deployed on a cluster, roll out the changes to all cluster members of the cluster on which the application or module is deployed. Click Rollout Update on the Enterprise applications page to propagate the changed configuration on all cluster members of the cluster on which the application or module is deployed. Rollout Update sequentially updates the configuration on the nodes that contain cluster members.
    Note: If a cluster has more than one member on the same node, all the members on the node are stopped at the same time.
    Best practice: At the end of the Installing messages displayed by the console during application or module installation, click Manage applications to go to the Enterprise applications page. Do not save changes to your configuration until after you roll out the changes.
  2. Save the changes to your configuration.

    On multiple-server products, after you click Save the product deletes the old application files and copies new files when the configuration on the deployment manager synchronizes with the configuration on the node where the application is installed.

    If the application is running when you update it, the application stops running before its files are copied to the destination directory of the node and restarts after the copy operation completes. Thus, the application is unavailable on the node during the time the node is synchronizing its configuration with the deployment manager.

  3. If needed, restart the application manually so the changes take effect.

    If the application is updated while it is running, the product automatically stops the application or only its changed components, updates the application logic, and restarts the stopped application or its components.

    If you update module metadata while an application is running, restarting the application might not be sufficient for the changes to take effect. For example, if you change descriptors in running Java EE 6 applications that use annotations, you must reinstall the application. If you change classes that introduce, remove, or alter class hierarchies within an application, and those changes impact annotated classes, you also must reinstall the application.

  4. If the application you are updating is deployed on a server that has its application class loader policy set to Single on the application server settings page, restart the server.