11th of May, starts 6:30pm at Skillsmatter

Register at this link: http://skillsmatter.com/podcast/ajax-ria/java-in-the-google-cloud

Ever since Google made App Engine available to the public the number one request has been for Java support. Finally Google have obliged and opened GAE/J (Google App Engine for Java or "Gay-Jay") to public beta. Unlike Amazon's cloud services GAE/J is based around a deployable application as the basic unit. You create your WAR, deploy it to Google's cloud infrastructure and Google publish it to the world and make it scale.

Tonight's Geek Night will be looking at a whole range of questions you might have about GAE/J. What does the cloud mean? What can it give me above deploying my own applications? Will Google own my data? How will I need to change my application to take advantage of GAE/J's features? How will it fit in with my existing applications? Can I use my favourite framework? Can I use all these hot new JVM languages and dynamic web frameworks?

That is whole lot of good questions and we've found the right people to answer them. Chris Read is a build and deployment specialist at ThoughtWorks who has been talking about Cloud technologies in general and has been working with a range of different Cloud services and software. Chris will give us the potted history of how we arrived at Cloud Computing when so many similar initiatives failed to take off. He will also outline what makes GAE/J different from other Cloud technologies.

Ola Bini is a core contributor to JRuby and was involved in the early partner testing of the GAE/J framework. He helped Google bring JRuby to the new platform and on the day of the launch published a series of blog posts explaining the challenges faced getting dynamic languages working on GAE/J and how to build and deploy your own JRuby on Rails application to the cloud. While getting your first Java application working on GAE/J will probably only take you ten minutes Ola will explain some of the differences you need to take into account between regular Java Web development and development on GAE/J. He will also look at how GAE/J and JRuby allows you combine the power of GAE with the pleasure of Ruby programming.

Of course the final element of any Geek Night is you, we need your questions (and your experiences with GAE/J if you have been one of the lucky 10,000 to get the early access account). So please join us for a night in the Java Cloud courtesy of Google App Engine.

Blog Posts

• Starbucks doesn't use Two-Phase Commits Gregor Hophe
• Paul Hammant
• Initial Post
• Alternative Ruby RIA clients with GAE/J
  
• Clojure on GAE/J
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