This is a crash course in the EJB architecture and API. The course starts with an overview of EJB at a relatively high-level; it then delves into the details of session beans (stateless and stateful), entity beans (CMP and BMP), transaction control, and finishes with a discussion of design tips. At the end of the course, attendees should be ready to code simple EJBs and to explore more advanced topics such as how entity beans relate to O/R mapping tools.

Target audience: Architects and programmers who are unfamiliar with EJB. A good understanding of Java is assumed. Familiarity with distributed programming is highly recommended.

What attendees will learn: Attendees will learn the fundamentals of the EJB API and architecture.

Tutorial outline:

1. Introduction
   1. Overview of how EJB fits into J2EE
   2. High-level EJB architecture
   3. Roles within EJB
   4. Client view of an EJB
2. Session Bean Architecture and API
   1. Stateless Session Beans
   2. Stateful Session Beans
      1. Passivation and activation
      2. Session Synchronization interface
3. Deployment
   1. Overview
   2. Deployment descriptor in EJB 1.0 (ser file)
   3. Deployment descriptor in EJB 1.1 (XML file)
   4. Deployment to an EJB server
4. EJBs and Transactions
5. 5. Entity Bean Architecture and API
   1. CMP Entity Beans
   2. BMP Entity Beans
6. Design Tips