Java Reference
In-Depth Information
Early in this topic we stated that i
BATIS
is a portable concept. It wasn't long after
the release of i
BATIS 2.0
that a new group of team members ported i
BATIS
to the
.
NET
platform. This appendix will give you a quick overview of i
BATIS
for the .
NET
platform.
A.1 Comparing iBATIS and iBATIS.NET
It's common in open source projects to have half-hearted ports to other platforms
that often fizzle out shortly after their inception. Not so with i
BATIS.NET
.
The i
BATIS.NET
team has been diligently keeping i
BATIS.NET
up to date with
the Java version, as well as improving the core feature set. i
BATIS.NET
is under the
same project umbrella as i
BATIS
for Java; we are the same team. This is a signifi-
cant advantage, because we are in constant communication and the developers
for each platform learn from each other every day. There are a lot of advantages
to both the Java and .
NET
platforms that we have been using to help encourage
innovation between the two.
Why should Java developers care about iBATIS.NET?
The fact is, .
NET
is here to stay. We are in a heterogeneous environment, and we
always have been. If you're a professional software developer who intends to stay
in the field for any length of time, you will need to expand your horizons beyond
Java. That's not to say that Java is going anywhere, but neither is .
NET
. If you're an
independent consultant, .
NET
is probably 50 percent of your market. Ignoring
this market is not good for business. If you're a full-time employee in a large orga-
nization, then chances are .
NET
will find its way into your environment in one
form or another. .
NET
is a valid platform that has its place in the enterprise.
The value to you as a Java developer learning i
BATIS
is that you can apply all of
the same principles to the persistence layer in .
NET
as you do in Java. There's no
difference, and there's no reason to be different. .
NET
has a lot of neat features
like
DataSet
s, which make a compelling argument for quick-and-dirty software
development, but for real enterprise applications, you're always better off with a
domain model. As you've learned by reading this topic, the ability to map domain
models to databases in the enterprise is an advantage of using i
BATIS
.
Why should .NET developers care about iBATIS.NET?
Many .
NET
developers are new to open source. .
NET
is a commercial product, and
therefore many of the recommended third-party solutions are commercial, closed
