Foreword Most well-architected EJB projects make use of design patterns.Whether or not a developer is actually aware that he's using design patterns is another story Oftentimes developers conceive of best practices during their projects,and aren't aware that these best practices are actually design patterns-reusable approaches to programming-that are beneficial to other developers on their projects as well. That is the beauty of the EJB design patterns presented in this book-they are practical,real-world patterns extracted from actual EJB projects.Members of the J2EE community were encouraged to share their patterns on TheServer- Side.com,a Web site where J2EE developers learn from each other.We've all worked together as a community to flesh out those patterns and bring them to You. Floyd Marinescu,the world's leading expert in EJB design patterns,led this EJB design patterns project initiative.Floyd and I have been working together for the past several years building The Middleware Company,a training and consulting company that helps developers master Enterprise Java.At The Middleware Company,we've been consulting on real-world projects to enhance the quality of the design patterns.We've also been teaching training courses on EJB design patterns to developers like you,and the feedback from those courses have improved the quality of this book tremendously. In this book,Floyd will show you a multitude of EJB design patterns that you can harness to enhance your EJB projects today.By applying these design patterns with proper judgment,you can improve the quality of your architec- ture,make your code more reusable and elegant,and architect your systems to be easily understood by developers who are familiar with these patterns. xi Most well-architected EJB projects make use of design patterns. Whether or not a developer is actually aware that he’s using design patterns is another story. Oftentimes developers conceive of best practices during their projects, and aren’t aware that these best practices are actually design patterns—reusable approaches to programming—that are beneficial to other developers on their projects as well. That is the beauty of the EJB design patterns presented in this book—they are practical, real-world patterns extracted from actual EJB projects. Members of the J2EE community were encouraged to share their patterns on TheServer￾Side.com, a Web site where J2EE developers learn from each other. We’ve all worked together as a community to flesh out those patterns and bring them to you. Floyd Marinescu, the world’s leading expert in EJB design patterns, led this EJB design patterns project initiative. Floyd and I have been working together for the past several years building The Middleware Company, a training and consulting company that helps developers master Enterprise Java. At The Middleware Company, we’ve been consulting on real-world projects to enhance the quality of the design patterns. We’ve also been teaching training courses on EJB design patterns to developers like you, and the feedback from those courses have improved the quality of this book tremendously. In this book, Floyd will show you a multitude of EJB design patterns that you can harness to enhance your EJB projects today. By applying these design patterns with proper judgment, you can improve the quality of your architec￾ture, make your code more reusable and elegant, and architect your systems to be easily understood by developers who are familiar with these patterns. Foreword xi