Compatibility with WebSphere Studio V5.1.x

When you first open any WebSphere Studio V5.1.x workspace in Rational Web Developer, it is automatically migrated. Once you have migrated a workspace, you can no longer open it in WebSphere Studio Site Developer. However, the projects in the V6.0 workspace can still be shared with WebSphere Studio V5.1.x, either by using a source code management (SCM) system (such as Rational ClearCase), by importing and exporting the project using Project Interchange, or through importing archives and exporting projects. Important: portlet applications from Portal Toolkit V5.0.2.2 that are migrated to Portal Tools in Rational Web Developer V6.0 will not be backward compatible.

Existing V5.1.x projects that are loaded into V6.0 from a SCM system or another developer using Project Interchange will be compatible for sharing with V5.1.x provided you do not take any the following actions:

A .compatibility file is automatically created in the project directory when a V5.1.x project is opened in the Rational Web Developer V6.0 workspace. The .compatibility file is used by Rational Web Developer to track the timestamps of project resources when these resources are migrated. You should not edit or delete it.

Eclipse considerations

This version of Rational Web Developer is based on Eclipse V3.0. If you develop your own plug-ins, you should read about changes to the platform before migrating.

For details, refer to the readme file in the sub-directory eclipse\readme of the installation location of Rational Web Developer V6.0. The sections of the readme file that are of interest for migration are:

Compatibility with Previous Releases
Upgrading Workspace from a Previous Release
Interoperability with Previous Releases

J2EE project compatibility

Compatibility of projects created in WebSphere Studio V5.1.x with Rational Web Developer V6.0 is enabled by means of metadata that is automatically added to .project files when you migrate your V5.1.x workspace. Similarly, if you create a new J2EE 1.2 or 1.3 module or application in Rational Web Developer V6.0, build metadata is automatically added to the .project file for compatibility with V5.1.x. Do not edit or delete this information directly.

Note: This compatibility metadata will cause messages about "missing builders" to be displayed or logged when a new J2EE 1.2 and J2EE 1.3 module or application created in V6.0 is used in WebSphere Studio Site Developer V5.1.x where the V6.0 builders are not available. These messages are normal; you can ignore them.

As long as this compatibility metadata is present, you will messages about "missing builders" when Rational Web Developer V6.0 projects are loaded back in WebSphere Studio V5.1.x. The following is an example of a "missing builder" message:

!ENTRY org.eclipse.core.resources 2 1 Sep 06, 2004 19:55:20.592
!MESSAGE Skipping builder com.ibm.wtp.j2ee.LibCopyBuilder for project Test60EARWeb. 
Either the builder is missing from the install, or it belongs to a project nature that is missing or disabled.

These messages are normal; you can ignore them. When you are sure you no longer need to work with a given project in WebSphere Studio V5.1.x, you can stop the messages by disabling backward compatibility for that project.

Important: New J2EE 1.2 or 1.3 specification projects created in V6.0 are compatible with WebSphere Studio V5.1.x, but once the project is loaded into WebSphere Studio there are some manual steps that are required before you can work with the project. These steps are required because runtime targets on new J2EE 1.2 or 1.3 specification projects created in 6.0 are not directly backward compatible to target servers in V5.1.x. The manual steps after loading a new V6.0 project in V5.1.x are as follows:

Open the .classpath file for each J2EE project that has a .classpath file.

Delete the following classpath entries from the .classpath file and save and close the file.

<classpathentry kind="con" 
path="org.eclipse.jdt.launching.JRE_CONTAINER/
org.eclipse.jdt.internal.debug.ui.launcher.StandardVMType/WebSphere v5.1 JRE"/>

<classpathentry kind="con" 
path="com.ibm.wtp.server.java.core.container/
com.ibm.etools.websphere.runtime.core.runtimeTarget.v51/was.base.v51"/>

Make sure server targeting support is enabled in the J2EE preferences page. Select Window > Preferences > J2EE and confirm that Enable server targeting support is selected under "Server Targeting Support."
Right click on the project and select Properties > J2EE.
Select the corresponding target server for the runtime target on the project (for example, WebSphere Application Server V5.1 using the JDK 1.4 runtime environment) and click OK.
The target server you selected will be compatible for both Rational Web Developer V6.0 and WebSphere Studio Site Developer V5.1.x. After the changes are committed into the SCM system, the J2EE projects are interoperable between V5.1.x and V6.0 using a SCM system.
Note: If the target server is set again in Rational Web Developer V6.0, J2EE project compatibility will be lost and will need to be reestablished.

Parent topic

Migrating from WebSphere Studio V5.1, 5.1.1, or 5.1.2