WebSphere Application Server Connector

Summary

Manage an existing IBM WebSphere Application Server (traditional) 8.5 or 9.0 installation directly from VS Code: create a server pointing at a local profile, start/stop it, and deploy .war/.ear files to it via wsadmin.

This extension is built on the open source rsp-server-community project (Runtime Server Protocol), and depends on the RSP UI extension, which is installed automatically and provides the Servers view and its commands.

By nicadevs.com.

Requirements

• An existing WAS 8.5 or 9.0 (traditional) installation and profile on the machine VS Code runs on. This extension does not download or install WAS - IBM's license doesn't allow that; you point it at a profile you already have.
• The profile's SOAP connector reachable from VS Code (wsadmin is invoked against it), and administrative security credentials if the profile has them enabled.

Adding a server

Use the Servers view's "+" action and choose "No, use server on disk", then browse to the WAS profile home (the folder containing bin/startServer.sh/.bat, bin/wsadmin.sh/.bat, and properties/version/profile.version). The extension reads the profile's real version to register it as WAS 8.5 or 9.0 automatically.

Server parameters

Right-click a server → Edit Server to change these:

Deploying

Add a .war or .ear as a deployable on the server, then Publish. The application name inside WAS defaults to the file name (without extension); you can override it via the deployment option shown when adding the deployable.

For multiple related deployables (e.g. several WARs that make up one application), add each one once - they stay associated with the server. From then on, right-click the server itself (not each deployable) and choose Full Publish to push whatever's currently built for all of them in one action.

Right-click a .war/.ear file in the Explorer and choose Run on Server or Debug on Server to add + publish + start (or restart) it in a single step.

Remote debugging

Right-click the server → Debug (instead of Start) to launch it with the JDWP debug agent enabled on was.debug.port. The extension configures the JVM's debug settings via wsadmin before launch, then starts the server; once the debug agent reports it's listening, VS Code's Java debugger attaches automatically (Debug (Remote) in the Run and Debug view) - set breakpoints in your servlet/EJB source beforehand.

Commands and features

This extension provides no additional commands beyond those available in rsp-ui; the Servers view, start/stop, and publish actions all come from there.