We’re pleased to announce the release of our new product, DataPower Buddy (dpbuddy). “dpbuddy” a free command-line tool for automating administration, management and deployment of IBM WebSphere DataPower appliances. The tool supports export/import, file transfer, backups and many other functions.
dpbuddy is implemented as a set of custom tasks for the popular build tool, Apache Ant.
Here is a quick example of dpbuddy in action:
This Ant task will remove remote directories if they exist, reproduce the local directory tree (all folders under “services”) on the device and upload the necessary files based on the “includes” pattern.
dpbuddy is completely free; it can be downloaded from the dpbuddy product page
dpbuddy provides many cool features, including:
* Response from the device is presented in a human-readable form as opposed to raw SOAP/XML messages. dpbuddy makes it easy to understand error and status messages.
* Powerful remote “copy” command that automatically reproduces local directory tree on the device.
* Tight integration with Ant. Ant variables can be used inside deployment policies and configuration files.
* Easy-to-use alternative to deployment policies based on XPath.
* Ability to remotely “tail” device logs. It is even possible to automatically get new log messages similarly to Unix “tail -f” command. “tail” task can also check for error patterns.
* “Export” based on naming patterns. You don’t need to know types (“classes”) of DataPower objects; simply specify a regexp pattern and dpbuddy will export all objects matching this pattern.
* Support for self-signed certificates. No need to add DataPower certificates to the JDK store.
* Support for arbitrary SOMA requests. You can use Ant variables inside a request.
* Parsing of all commands on the client. In case of XML errors, DataPower returns cryptic “internal error” message. The actual error then has to be extracted from the device logs. dpbuddy on the other hand validates management XML commands on the client and displays error messages right away.
Go to dpbuddy product page to learn more.