Is Tomcat an application server?

This is a long prevailing confusion whether Tomcat is an application server and always worth discussions.

Tomcat is one of the most popular options for lightweight development scenarios, and in many cases meets the need for an application server, even though it is technically a Web server. In this article Jeff Hanson engages the question of whether Tomcat is an app server, first by explaining what differentiates application servers, Web servers, and Java EE containers, and then by evaluating Tomcat's suitability to a variety of common Java enterprise development scenarios.

I read this very good article on Java World today, which explains the difference quite nicely, though every one may not agree with the author's opinion entirely. So its worth visiting the comments section as well.

First the difference between app servers, Web servers, and Java EE containers are explained from JAVA EE point of view.

Then some scenarios where a Web server like Tomcat could be used appropriately as an app server.
demonstratons using scaled architecture, starting with the lightweight implementation where Tomcat shines, and concluding with a complex service-oriented architecture e.g. where you would be better off with a full-fledged Java EE application server.


Read Full Article here.

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