[jdev] Server choices and integration with web server?

[Justin Fagnani]

Hi,

I'm new to Jabber and this list. I want to run a Jabber server on my 
web server and integrate the two. I'd like to have a web page that 
lists all the connected users, etc. Later I'm going to need to add 
other services to the Jabber server.

I haven't chosen a server to work with yet, so I'm hoping for some 
advice on which project would be easier to use and customize. I do most 
of my programming in Java and web development with Apache Cocoon.

So far I've looked mostly at Open-IM and Jive Messenger. Open-IM seems 
like it might be in a weird state right now; I'm not sure how actively 
it's being worked on. Jive Messenger is very active and they just 
released a new version, but it requires Java 1.5 which is a bit of a 
problem.

I'm also unsure what the best was to integrate is. If Cocoon and Jabber 
are run in the same JVM then certain things become real easy, but it 
ties the solution together very (too?) tightly and might not scale well 
with many users. Another option is to link the jabber and web side 
through a socket. Then each could run on separate servers and I could 
switch one software package for another if it could use the same 
protocol. Is there a standard for getting that kind of information 
(global admin type stuff) out of a Jabber server, say an XMPP Admin 
schema?

I think sockets is obviously the better long term solution, but right 
now I just want to get a prototype up and running.

Any advice would be much appreciated.

Thanks,
   Justin