OSGi capability of the components

[Florian Huonder]

Hi everybody
I am very convinced that we should make OSGi bundles out of our components (XACML, PDP, PEP, ...).
From my point of view there are some pros:

• Easier integration of our components into already existing environments, e.g. run the PDP within an application server among other applications
• Be ready for the next generation of application servers that are fully based on OSGi (e.g. Spring dm server)
• For OSGi enabled applications an easy integration of the PEP is possible
• Enhancing the components with OSGi capabilities (meaning adding OSGi-specific information to the Manifest) does not influence non-OSGi-enabled applications at all
• Easier management of e.g. functions, datatypes, resource bundles etc. that could be provided as OSGi-fragments. So a runtime-extension would be possible out of the box.

Maybe there are other points.
In my humble opinion, there are no real drawbacks with adding OSGi-capability.

I am very interested in your opinion.

Regards,
Florian

[Wolfgang Giersche]

Hi,

After carefully rethinking my former prejudices, I now fully support Flo's opinion. Particularly, I'm convinced that the existing Java PEP's (and future ones with it) acceptance in the market will improve. And yes, certainly, also the PDP server side would allow for easier integration in existing and upcoming OSGi-based app servers. We should estimate and prioritize accordingly.

Wolfgang