Enterprise Java exception tracking in the cloud with Raygun

If you’re in the Java enterprise space, like many other ecosystems you will no doubt be well versed in the buzz surrounding cloud technologies and the benefits they can bring to your organization. PaaS and IaaS are invaluable new methods to deploy your applications and services with lower costs and maintenance overheads. As an example, web applications prototypes can be quickly spun up and deployed across staging environments to garner client feedback and performance data.

As many in the enterprise world consider migrating legacy codebases or starting greenfields projects with cloud tech, it becomes important to consider how to manage the impact software errors has on users. Another important concern is often mobile app development, for instance on the Android platform. Raygun’s feature set is designed to alleviate these concerns and help enterprise Java developers keep their applications and services healthy.

Applications deployed on both traditional IT infrastructure & cloud-based systems challenge maintainers with regards to system status & error visibility. Previously, logging systems were relied on, perhaps in combination with emails sent if a critical piece of infrastructure goes down, but this results in maintainers drowning in a sea of alerts. It’s a naive solution that lacks any team communication or other service integration. Raygun’s error grouping remedies this by grouping similar exceptions together and providing email notifications and daily summaries. We find many teams lean heavily on the comment feature for grouping when discussing a new issue, as well as integration with their existing issue trackers or project management tools.

An example case is rapid prototyping on Google App Engine. Raygun supports both Java and Python for automatic error and exception catching on this PaaS, including lightening-quick async exception transmission so you the user receives the appropriate HTTP error page without delay. Prototypes can be quickly iterated and have data received on their performance which exist in a tight feedback loop that increases site quality remarkably.

Part of the power of cloud technologies is how easily they can be incorporated with one another. Through the use of public APIs and technologies like webhooks a service or application gains added value quickly and can integrate with customer’s existing workflows. This is invaluable, but in order to deal with the huge request loads that can come from these you need smarter error solutions than just logging and unit/integration testing. Staging environments can also help with this as you can catch a flood of exceptions quickly in a beta environment with Raygun, before they are deployed to production. Raygun also comes with out-of-the-box support for popular dev services like Jira and GitHub issue trackers, and HipChat and Trello communication services, which means it can be integrated into your team’s workflow painlessly.

The Java ecosystem continues to have a large impact, especially considering the rise of platforms like Android. Teams developing companion (or standalone) apps can have Raygun plugged in to them too, alongside their back-end service and front-end site. The Android provider has additional smarts, such as collection exceptions when network connectivity is lost, then sending when it is regained. Many teams who have tried Raygun find it incredibly useful to have full visibility on every error that happens to every customer across their entire infrastructure.

If you’d like more information about how Raygun can be integrated with your Java codebase you can contact us in the links below or post a comment here or in the forums. And when you’re ready to try it out get the 30-day free trial here (no need to enter a credit card). Thanks for reading!