IBM WebSphere Interview Questions

What is WebSphere?

WebSphere refers to a brand for IBM software products. It is designed for setting up, operation and integration of electronic business applications. These applications could perform well on cross platform environment. These sets of software are Java based web technologies.

What is WebSphere Commerce?

- IBM WebSphere Commerce is a software platform framework for e-commerce, including marketing, sales, customer and order processing functionality in a tailorable, integrated package.

It is a single, unified platform which offers the ability to do business:

-Directly with consumers (B2C),

-With businesses (B2B),

-Indirectly through channel partners , or

        -All of these simultaneously.

- It is a customizable, scalable and high availability solution built on the Java EE platform using XML and Web services.

Explain the architecture of WebSphere.

-The WebSphere HTTP plug-in architecture has the following characteristics:

-The Web server plug-in is implemented as a filter, which examines all incoming HTTP requests and routes -them to other Web servers based on the composition of the URL.

-Each Web server has it’s own API that allows filters to be implemented.

-Standards-based protocols (HTTP/S) that are supported by firewall products are used.

-SSL can be used within the DMZ to encrypt network traffic between the Web server and the application server.

-The configuration file used by the plug-in is XML-based, and easy to administer. Multiple redirection rules may be defined to one or more application servers as dictated by the topology chosen.

-The plug-in supports load balancing and failover capabilities, which offer further scalability with very little additional administrative effort.

State some of the features present in Websphere.

WebSphere applications use the following kinds of technologies:

-Java specifications and other open standards for developing applications.

-WebSphere programming model extensions to enhance application functionality.

-Containers and services in the application server, used by deployed applications, and which sometimes can be extended.

What is IBM WebSphere edge server?

WebSphere Edge is a set of web server/application server components that are intended to improve the performance of web-based systems.

It is part of the IBM WebSphere product suite.

Edge Server comprises 4 basic components:

-Network Dispatcher

-Caching Proxy

-Content Distribution

               - Application Service at the Edge

Edge can be configured for high availability with a backup Edge failover server that takes over sessions if the primary Edge server fails.

What is extended deployment in WebSphere?

WebSphere Extended Deployment delivers enhanced Qualities of Service with features for optimizing IT resources.

The suite comprises of 3 products:

WebSphere Virtual Enterprise:

- It increases flexibility and agility to ensure business process integrity, improve service, application performance, and better manage health. - It provides application infrastructure virtualization capabilities that lower costs required to create, manage, and run enterprise applications and an SOA environment.

WebSphere eXtreme Scale:

- It is an essential IBM software technology for conducting extreme transaction processing. - It allows business applications to process exceptionally large volumes of transactions with extreme efficiency and linear scalability. - It provides transactional integrity and transparent failover to ensure high availability, high reliability, and constant response times. - It operates as an in-memory data grid that dynamically caches, partitions, replicates, and manages application data and business logic across multiple servers.

Compute Grid:

- Enables the scheduling, execution and monitoring of batch type jobs with enhanced service policy and workload management

Define asymmetric clustering in WebSphere?

 -Asymmetric clustering architecture is opposite to the typical stateless server farm where the entire app is replicated across machines, sometimes using distributed caching products for improving the performance.

-In an asymmetric cluster, business logic is split into partitions, where each partition can be the sole accessory of a set of underlying data.

-This results in each node in the cluster implementing it's own local cache resulting in high performance reading and writing without the need to maintain a distributed cache between cluster nodes.

What is WebSphere MQ JMS Provider?

-IBM WebSphere MQ classes for Java Message Service are a set of Java classes that enables the JMS applications to access WebSphere MQ systems.

-Both the point-to-point and publish/subscribe models of JMS are supported.

-These Java classes are available as part of the IBM WebSphere MQ client support.

Explain the attribute CHANNEL in WebSphere MQ.

-The attributes of a channel are chosen to be optimal for a given set of circumstances for each channel. However, when the channel is running, the actual values may have changed during startup negotiations.

-Many attributes have default values, and you can use these for most channels.

-In WebSphere MQ for iSeries, most attributes can be specified as *SYSDG TCHL, which means that the value is taken from the system default channel in your system.

Explain about WebSphere MQ Real time transport.

-WebSphere MQ Real-time Transport is a lightweight protocol optimized for use with non persistent messaging.

-It is used by JMS clients, and provides high levels of scalability and message throughput.

-WebSphere MQ Real-time Transport is ideal for applications where large numbers of messages need to be sent or where messages need to be sent to large numbers of client applications.

-The WebSphere MQ Real-time Transport does not provide any facilities for persistent messaging or durable subscriptions.

Mention what are the Websphere MQ programming APIs?

Websphere MQ programming APIs include

AMI (Application Messaging Interface)

JMS (Java Message Service)

MQI (Message Queue Interface)