Storing ejb-jar.xml and weblogic-ejb-jar.xml

Question

We are using Weblogic Integration 9.2 on a 2 cluster system sharing the same domain directory.
1) I am wondering if I can store these files somewhere in the domains directory instead of the EJB's archive - call it MyEjb.jar?
2) Are there any benefits to storing these files outside of the MyEjb.jar file? I am thinking to make it easier to update the configurations such as number of MDB consumers and such to avoid having to recreate the MyEjb.jar with the new config and redeploy the application. A simple text edit and bounce could be fine if the files can be stored outside.
2b) Can another application in the same domain read these files to find out the connection factory and queue information?
3) Are there any disadvantages to storing those files outside of the jar file? One issue I can think of here is how to deal with them on a cluster environment.
4) Any other feedback apprecaited.

Answer 1

If you look at the contents of a deployment plan (Plan.xml) when you have it generated
<deployment-plan ...>
  <module-override>
    <module-name>ejb.jar</module-name>
    <module-type>ejb</module-type>
    <module-descriptor external="true">
      <root-element>weblogic-ejb-jar</root-element>
      <uri>META-INF/weblogic-ejb-jar.xml</uri>
    </module-descriptor>
    <module-descriptor external="false">
      <root-element>ejb-jar</root-element>
      <uri>META-INF/ejb-jar.xml</uri>
    </module-descriptor>
    <module-descriptor external="true">
      <root-element>persistence-configuration</root-element>
      <uri>META-INF/persistence-configuration.xml</uri>
    </module-descriptor>
    <module-descriptor external="false">
      <root-element>persistence</root-element>
      <uri>META-INF/persistence.xml</uri>
    </module-descriptor>
  </module-override>
</deployment-plan>You can see which files can be external and which can be not. The weblogic-ejb-jar.xml can be external
but in this case you need a deployment plan to point weblogic to the file. The ejb-jar.xml cannot be
external (see external=false)
The benefit of storing the weblogic-ejb-jar.xml is that your administrator can fine tune certain
configurations by using a deployment plan, instead of having to extract the contents from the jar file
and then repackage it again.
No need to worry about a clustered environment, you can place the jar and the deployment plan
on the server where the admin server is located, when you deploy an application you deploy it to
the cluster and everything is taken care off.
More information on deployment plans can be found here: http://download.oracle.com/docs/cd/E11035_01/wls100/deployment/config.html