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WebSphere Portal Support in MyEclipse

This document outlines some of the key components of support and development for working with WebSphere Portal servers in MyEclipse.

WebSphere requires a MyEclipse Blue or Bling subscription.

1. WebSphere Portal Server Support 

This document outlines some of the key components of support and development for working with WebSphere Portal servers in MyEclipse. The topics covered in this overview build on information found in the basic Portlet overview for MyEclipse.  This document covers aspects of Portlet development specific to developers working with WebSphere Portal 7.x & 8.x servers.

MyEclipse for WebSphere includes server connectors that support WebSphere Portal server versions 6.1 through 8.x. After you configure WebSphere Portal server, it is available in the Servers view along with other servers.  

portal_connector
Configured WebSphere Portal server in Servers view

Configure the WebSphere Portal like other WebSphere connectors. There are a few fields specific to portal servers to pay attention to. The most important are the portal server home directory, the portal server-specific profile, and the server name that specifies the WebSphere_Portal server. WebSphere Portal server also requires a username and password to operate, so those details must be provided, as well.

wps_configuration
WebSphere Portal server configuration

2. Adding JSR WebSphere Portal Support to a Web Project

To develop applications for deployment to WebSphere Portal, you need to add JSR Portlets facets to your web project. Add this support by selecting the project and choosing MyEclipse>Project Facets>Install JSR Portlets Facet. 

addPortletCapabilities
Adding portlet capabilities to a web project

For WebSphere Portal 7 or 8, choose JSR 286. Select your WebSphere Portal version from the Target runtime drop-down.

Note: For WebSphere Portal 7.0, your Web project must use the Web 2.5 specification, rather than Web 3.0. WebSphere Portal 8.0 supports Web 3.0.

addPortletCapabilitiesWindow
Adding the Portlet facet

When you click Finish, the project is ready to support JSR Portlet development that can be deployed to WebSphere Portal server.

3. WebSphere Portal Deployment Support

After you have a portlet application configured for WebSphere Portal 7.0 or 8.0 and have added a few JSR 286 style portlets to the project, you are ready to deploy them to WebSphere Portal server. The only restriction on deployment is that the portal server must be running (online) for portal engine deployment to occur.

deploy_portal_proj
Deploying a project to WebSphere Portal server

During deployment, the application is deployed as a normal Java EE Web Application to the WebSphere app server running the portal engine. At the end of this “normal” deployment, if MyEclipse detects that you have portlets support added to your project, a special WebSphere portal engine deployment will take place transparently. 

The same thing occurs with undeployment. When you remove the Java EE web application deployment, if MyEclipse detects that your project is a portlet project, it will undeploy all the portlets from the WebSphere Portal server.

4. WebSphere Portal Configuration Overview

After you deploy your project to WebSphere Portal 7.0 or 8.0 server, you can search for the deployed web application on the Administration>Portlet Management>Web Modules page.

wps_portal_admin
Viewing the deployed web application

Any portlets defined in your web application are registered with the portal server. Those portlets are available on the Portlets page if you search for them by name. 

portlet_search
Portlet search

After you find a portlet, it can be added to a portal page with the click of a button.

portal_deploy5
Adding a portlet to the page

After the portlet is running on the portal server page, it acts like a normal Java EE web application running on a server. If the server is in debug mode, normal developmental features like Java and JSP debugging, hot-swap, and hot-sync debugging are available. 

5. Resources