As of early November 2013, Oracle will stop offering commercial support for new version of the open-source application server GlassFish. This leaves customers who require their support with only the option of moving to WebLogic Server.

This comes just prior to the release of GlassFish Open Source Edition 4.1 in 2014 but they will not be releasing a commercial version of the product they acquired when Oracle bought Sun Microsystems.

Current customers with GlassFish Serve 2 or 3 will continue to receive support but this will leave a short term gap for some as WebLogic will be the only Java EE 7 compatible option. TmaxSoft has its JEUS 8 application server and it has achieved Java EE 7 compatibility but it isn’t scheduled for release until next year.

Oracle is strongly suggesting the move to WebLogic Server so that:

• Applications developed to Java EE standards can be deployed to both GlassFish Server and Oracle WebLogic Server.
• GlassFish Server and Oracle WebLogic Server have implementation-specific deployment descriptor interoperability.
• GlassFish Server 3.x and Oracle WebLogic Server share quite a bit of code, so there are quite a bit of configuration and (extended) feature similarities. Shared code includes JPA, JAX-RS, WebSockets, CDI, Bean Validation, JSF, JAX-WS, JAXB, and WS-AT.
• Both Oracle GlassFish Server 3.x and Oracle WebLogic Server 12c support Oracle Access Manager, Oracle Coherence, Oracle Directory Server, Oracle Virtual Directory, Oracle Database, Oracle Enterprise Manager and are entitled to support for the underlying Oracle JDK.

One option for companies affected who don’t want to pay the considerably greater cost of WebLogic may wish to secure the services of an outsourced firm who can offer similar management and development support for GlassFish and its future permutations. Still others who do want to make the move to WebLogic and seeking the outside expertise of firms that specialize in supporting the migration of application server types is likely going to save you both time and money.

A number of firms in North America maintain local project managers that take advantage of low cost development and system migration expertise found in offshore outsourcing. These companies have the ability to maintain their relationship throughout the project with managers you can meet with face to face and yet still take advantage of lower staffing costs available with offshore technical teams.