Apache geronimo is an open source application server developed by the apache software foundation and distributed under the apache license. geronimo is currently compatible with the java enterprise edition (java ee) 5.0 specification.

the javabeans activation framework (jaf) extension to java allows developers to determine the type of an arbitrary piece of data, to encapsulate access to it, to discover the operations available on it, and to instantiate the appropriate bean to perform said operation(s). for example, if a browser obtained a png image, jaf would help the browser to identify that stream of data as a png image, and the browser can instantiate an object to display that image.

another dfsg free jaf implementation is available from the glassfish project.