Java.io in J2ee stateless session bean, general questions about debugging

Question

Doing conventional Java IO (with java.io functions and classes such as
PrintWriter and println) in a Enterprise bean has been discussed before
in this and other forum. We know that the EJB specification says not to do it.
(For example the EJB 2.0 spec, 24.1.2) says that an enterprise
bean must not use the java.io package to attempt to access files and
directories int he file system."
The discussion in various forums including this one is that
a) using java.io in a bean would impact portability, ability to
move the bean for load balancing
b) However, this is not always an an issue and it may be reasonable
to use these functions anyway. e. g. see the response by "maozhoulu"
on Jun 21, 2002.
I tried it in Sun Application Server Nine in my stateless Session Bean:
package RS;
import RS.CourseHome;
import RS.CoursePK;
import java.rmi.RemoteException;
import javax.naming.InitialContext;
import javax.naming.Context;
import javax.rmi.PortableRemoteObject;
import javax.ejb.EJBException;
import java.io.*;
public class AddCourseBean implements javax.ejb.SessionBean {
   public void ejbCreate(){};
   public void CreateCourse (int CourseNumber, String CourseName) {
    try {
     System.out.println("in Create Course");
     PrintWriter F = null;
     try {
      F = new PrintWriter (new FileOutputStream("/tmp/v/af"));
     catch (java.io.FileNotFoundException fe){}
     F.println ("here zero");F.flush();
     InitialContext jndiContext = new InitialContext();
     F.println ("here one");F.flush();
     Object o = jndiContext.lookup("ejb/X");
         ...I got a Null pointer exception on the line:
"F.println("here zero"); Is there anyway one can do simple debugging with print lines in one's beans?
Or is there something obviousthat I am overlooking? (I saw mention of doing
debugging with System.out.println but to where would the bean write?)
I tried using the Jakarta Commons Logging, but I got a
java.lang.NoClassDefFoundError on org/apache/commons/logging/LogFactory
Which logging system does one use in GlassFish, hopefully one with minimal
configuration? I want to do some debugging, not set up logging for a full
enterprise system.
Thanks for your insight and advice.
Dr. Laurence Leff, Associate Professor of Computer Science WIU ST447 61455
Pager 309 367 0787, Fax [phone]

Answer 1

My apology for posting this message twice. I looked for it before and
did not see it. I thought I forget to click the "Post message" button.
Also, I did resolve one problem. System.out.println does go to
the log file, which in my case turned out to be:
/opt/j2ee/SUNWappserver/domains/domain1/logs/server.log
(Obvously, the first part would vary based upon where you installed your
Application Server Nine.)
However, it would be nice if there was some way to use FILE I/O inside of
beans. I am teaching some J2EE in the graduate software engineering course,
and I believe this would be pedagogically sound even if other techniques
would be appropriate for a production environment.
Thanks for your patience with this problem and my duplicate post.