We mentioned previously that JBoss ESB, just like other JBoss open source projects, is a community project. It's free for you to use, but it is not supported with a service level agreement (SLA). You don't get a 1-800 number to call for help at 2AM on a Sunday.
Remember, you're a member of a community, and you are not alone. You have access to multiple resources.
You can ask questions, and review questions that have been asked in the past in online forums.
At first glance, being told to search a user forum for an answer to a problem that you are having with software may sound like a brush in the same league as RTFM ("read the fine manual") After all, every commercial software product has a user forum these days. Actually, every product of any kind has a forum these days.
There are, however, very important differences between JBoss project forums and forums for closed software products. In forums dedicated to closed source software, you can often see conversations between users where they share experiences and attempt to discern the root causes of problems, where the inner workings and designs of the software is a black box. They, in effect, pool their ignorance in the hope of solving a puzzle from the outside in. Also, In JBoss forums, the community members who respond to forum questions are either the people who have designed and built the software, or are other users who all share one common characteristic; they all have access to the source code.
There are actually two separate forums.
This forum (http://community.jboss.org/en/jbossesb?view=discussions) is intended to handle all problems using JBoss ESB. For example, if you have a problem with an installation, or cannot find a specific resource, or have any type of question on your initial experiences, you should ask it in the user forum. But, as literally thousands of people have used JBoss ESB before you, there is a good chance that whatever question you are asking has already been asked before. So, before you post a new question, search the forum to see if it's really an old question that has already been asked (and answered) before.
This forum (http://community.jboss.org/en/jbossesb/dev?view=discussions) is intended for questions related to the development of JBoss ESB. You should try to make sure to ask your questions related to the use of JBoss ESB on the user forum, which is higher traffic and has a higher participation rate from members of the community in the User Forum. You can also subscribe to RSS feeds for these forums, so that you can see new questions as they are asked and answers to new and old questions.
In addition to the forums you also have access to the JBoss ESB project wiki and blog. The wiki (http://community.jboss.org/wiki/JBoss ESB) contains hundreds of useful articles on configuring and using specific features of JBoss ESB. The JBoss ESB blog (http://jbossesb.blogspot.com/) has a lower level of traffic, and tends to cover new announcements and more time-critical subjects.
The JBoss ESB project has multiple active mailing lists (http://www.jboss.org/jbossesb/lists). All of these are open for anyone to subscribe to. It's a good idea to look at the archive of these lists before you subscribe so you can get an idea of the type of information communicated through the lists, and the frequency of the mail messages:
- esb-announce (https://lists.jboss.org/mailman/listinfo/esb-announce): This list is used for general announcements, such as when a new release of JBoss ESB is available.
- esb-users (https://lists.jboss.org/mailman/listinfo/esb-users): This list is intended to complement the user forum, not duplicate or replace it. It's intended to provide a way for users and the JBoss ESB development team to communicate. If you are tempted to use this list to ask basic, newbie type questions, please don't! Questions of that type are better asked in the user forum.
- esb-commits (https://lists.jboss.org/mailman/listinfo/esb-commits): This list is used for svn (subversion) commit announcements. You probably don't want to subscribe to this list unless you are actively involved in making changes to JBoss ESB project code.
- esb-dev (https://lists.jboss.org/mailman/listinfo/esb-dev): This list is intended to complement the development forum by providing a way for the developers to communicate.
- esb-issues (https://lists.jboss.org/mailman/listinfo/esb-issues): JBoss ESB uses JIRA for bug and issue tracking. When a JIRA is logged or modified, an announcement is sent to this list.
There's one aspect of closed source software that can make systems integration work difficult. Just as the source is closed, so are the bugs. When you purchase a closed source product, you may receive a list of resolved problems, but it is likely that this list is incomplete and sanitized so as to present a positive view of the product.
With JBoss open source software, in contrast, the bug tracking database is as open as the code. You can see all the bugs, tasks related to the project, and the feature requests at http://jira.jboss.org. Now, it may at first appear as though JBoss projects are plagued with alarmingly large numbers of bugs. It's important to keep in mind that since ALL the bugs are logged in JIRA, some of the bugs are actually user errors, duplicates, problems with the samples or documentation, or even problems that have already been resolved.
Remember, you're not looking at a carefully screened Potemkin Village-like (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Potemkin_village) view of the bug database, you're looking at all of them. Note that the only bugs that are not publicly viewable are related to security issues. These issues are generally kept private until they are resolved so as to not put users of the software at risk. And, if the number of bugs in JIRA for an open source project does seem too large, just try asking your closed source software suppliers for full and open access to their bug tracking systems. It's doubtful that any access that you receive will be full and open.
Finally, you can talk to live people! The JBoss ESB project has an IRC (Internet Relay Chat), channel at irc.freenode.net #jbossesb. You can use this channel to direct questions to JBoss ESB project community members. Check this out when you get a chance. Regardless of your timezone, you'll find someone online in the #jbossesb channel.