Difference between War, Jar & Ear

1.JAR : JAVA Archives and it allows aggregating many files into One.It usually hold java classes in lib.

JAR files (Java ARchive) allows aggregating many files into one, it is usually used to hold Java classes in a library. i.e. Math.jar 

(file with a .jar extension)

2.War(web archive)   This is Web Application archive which contains basic web application like servlet, jsp, html. This can be run on simple tomcat server

WAR files are similar to JAR files, except that they are specifically for web applications made from Servlets, JSPs, and supporting classes(file with a .war extension)

3.Ear (: Enterprise Archives)

An EAR file is an enterprise application deployed to an application server like WebLogic, WebSphere, JBOSS, etc. It might contain WARs, JARs, etc. 

EAR = WAR(Web module) + JAR(can be EJB module or application client module)

files with a .ear extension




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