I just finished fixing a bug in the unreleased development version of WebLogic Event Server. The code in question leveraged some advanced features of the Spring Framework and was something that I had had to code around in EvS 2.0. Fortunately, for me, I had spent a bunch of time with Juergen Hoeller at SpringOne last year discussing some of the ways we were trying to use Spring in EvS and how we were running into a few problems. The free beer that BEA provided at the event was a great persuader and I subsequently raised a bunch of enhancement JIRA's which Juergen fixed for me (SPR-3609, SPR-3364, SPR-3608 for the curious).
The great thing is that since EvS is essentially an open platform, we can leverage these technologies bringing value-added functionality to market more quickly. Even better SPR-3608 turned out to be absolutely essential for EvS 2.0 and so, since Spring is open source, I was able to make the fix myself and allow EvS 2.0 to ship on time. Now that we are working on EvS 3.0 - which is based on Spring 2.5.x - I am able to pick up the official fix from Juergen and don't have to maintain a forked version of Spring 2.0.5.
This experience is not unique. Many features in Spring-DM, which we use heavily in EvS, were influenced by EvS requirements (or coded by me!). Although the SpringSource folks are quick to challenge stupid ideas, they are also cognizant of the fact that customers drive their business, and Costin graciously accepted the majority of my requests and submissions for Spring-DM. In fact one of the key features of Spring-DM - automatic activation of application contexts, which is essentially the EvS deployment model - was conceived and implemented by a BEA engineer.
As an engineer who has had to deal with a somewhat more glacial approach from other organizations, the approach is a breath of fresh air. And the key is open-ness - the open-ness of the EvS platform approach and the opensourciness [?] of many of the technologies that we leverage - not just Spring. This gives a great deal of comfort to our customers, since their commitment to our platform is not a case of vendor lock-in, but more a synergistic union of open technologies. They benefit not just from a fast turnaround on development, but wider understanding and support of the underlying technologies.
And the bug? Too embarrassing to discuss.
