Java Reference
In-Depth Information
The NetBeans download page should detect the operating system being used to
access it, and the appropriate platform should be selected by default. If this is not
the case, or if you are downloading NetBeans with the intention of installing it in
another workstation on another platform, the correct platform can be selected from
the drop-down labeled, appropriately enough,
Platform
.
Once the correct platform has been selected, we need to click on the appropriate
download button for the NetBeans pack we wish to install; for Java EE development,
we need either the
Java
or the
All
Pack. NetBeans will then be downloaded to a
directory of our choosing.
Java EE applications need to be deployed to an application server.
Several application servers exist in the market, both the
Java
and the
All
NetBeans Packs come with GlassFish bundled. GlassFish is a 100 percent
Java EE compliant application server. We will be using the bundled
GlassFish application server to deploy and execute our examples.
Installing NetBeans
NetBeans requires a
Java Development Kit
(
JDK
) version 5.0 or newer to be
available before it can be installed.
Since this topic is aimed at experienced Java Developers, we will not
spend much time explaining how to install and configure the JDK, since
we can safely assume the target market for the topic more than likely
has a JDK installed. Installation instructions for JDK 6 Update 3 (the
latest at the time of writing) can be found at
http://java.sun.com/
javase/6/webnotes/install/index.html
.
Readers wishing to use Mac OS X can get installation instructions and the
JDK download for their platform at
http://developer.apple.com/
java/
, please note that Java 5 is supplied as standard with OS X 10.4 and
above, as such Mac OS X developers should not need to download the JDK.
NetBeans installation varies slightly between the supported platforms. In the following
few sections we'll look at how to install NetBeans on each supported platform.
Microsoft Windows
For Microsoft Windows platforms, NetBeans is downloaded as an executable file
named something like
netbeans-6.5-windows.exe
(the exact name depends on
the version of NetBeans and the NetBeans pack that was selected for download).
To install NetBeans on Windows platforms, simply navigate to the folder where
NetBeans was installed and double-click on the executable file that was downloaded.
