Having read at least one and a half of Richard Monson-Haefel’s tomes I’m impressed that that he’s come around to the painful complexity that is J2EE:
Over the years however, EJB and its super set, J2EE, became increasingly complex until there was so much information it was difficult if not impossible to swallow. Today I’m a recovering J2EE developer; I’ve successfully regurgitated the massive J2EE bolus that slowed me down and made me mentally lethargic.
As an analyst for the Burton Group at least he can point out the potential faults of vendor driven highly complex standards like WS-*. Now if only we came across more skeptics at places like Gartner.