Using Tomcat for production, licensing issues

[cheguvera]

Hi all,

I work for a small business. We are around 5 to 10 people in the office.
I want to build a small application which we all can access in office, over network. Can I use Tomcat for this purpose?

Technically, Yes, I know its a http server along with application server, so I can use it to build J2EE application.

But if we use it for our office, that will be commercial use. Will that still be free? or that will cost us money?

Please suggest from your experiances.

Regards

 

[sedj]

You can use Tomcat for commercial uses with no restrictions at all, for free.

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Free Java/J2EE Database Connection Pooling Software

http://www.primrose.org.uk

 

[cheguvera]

Hi,

To be honest, I have a doubt.
I was not able to find the licensing details on Tomcat's web site.
Also, I heard from one of my friend that, its free for development and not for production. But he has also not seen the actual terms from Tomcat.

Please guide.

Regards

 

[sedj]

Hmmm... I have been using Tomcat in a commerial environment for 3 years ... you believe whatver you want to believe - I am *telling you* you can use Tomcat in a commercial environment with no licensing issues. If you disagree with this, please provide Apache documentation on it .... I would love to see your friend's proof !

--------------------------------------------------
Free Java/J2EE Database Connection Pooling Software

http://www.primrose.org.uk

 

[cheguvera]

Hi sedj,

I have no claim what-so-ever that, I am clever then you.

You are completely and absolutely correct,

http://www.apache.org/foundation/licence-FAQ.html#IsItFee

My whole point was, I want to make sure 101% before I start doing any work using Tomcat.

Thanks for your help.

 

[sedj]

Well you can continue with no worries

BTW, another open-source container is Jetty -

http://jetty.mortbay.org/jetty/

Now, in many ways I believe Jetty is actually a better servlet container than Tomcat - its not so *heavy* in the codebase it contains, and I just think a better product (its more of a *feeling* about using Jetty and Tomcat, rather than expressly quantifiable).
A common use of web servers is to use Apache HTTP server as a "front end" for serving images, static content etc, and then use Apache to forward requests to Tomcat for JSPs/servlets etc. Now, I find this architecture quite unstable under heavy load - but Jetty provides both services under one codebase - less config and less points of failure. Also, people seem to believe that Jetty scales better than Tomcat.

One thing that does make someone wonder - Apache's new J2EE server, Geronimo, uses Jetty as its default servlet container rather than Tomcat - quite telling in my opinion. (Jetty is also free for commercial use).

--------------------------------------------------
Free Java/J2EE Database Connection Pooling Software

http://www.primrose.org.uk

 

[cheguvera]

Hi,

Thanks a lot.
That was very usefull, I am now thinking of going for Jetty.

My application will be a fault/problem logging system (broadly) for my office, which will have at the most 5 to 10 concurrent users, sitting on Oracle 10 database.

So, if I have one software which is web server and servlet container, what else I need? and Yes, Apache proves your point.

Thanks again.

regards