5.0.0.BETA2 released with better distribution!

Initial implementation of virtual nodes for consistent hash algorithm based distribution is included. This means that each Infinispan node can now pick multiple nodes in the hash wheel reducing the standard deviation and so improving the distribution of data. The configuration is done via the numVirtualNodes attribute in hash element.

The externalizer configuration has been revamped in order to make it more user-friendly! You only need the @SerializeWith annotation and an Externalizer implementation in its most basic form, but more advanced externalizer configuration is still available for particular use cases. The wiki on plugging externalizers has been rewritten to show these changes.

lazyDeserialization XML element has been renamed to *http://docs.jboss.org/infinispan/5.0/apidocs/config.html#ce_default_storeAsBinary[storeAsBinary]* in order to better represent its function. The previous programmatic configuration for this option has been deprecated to help ease migration but your XML will need changing.

All references to JOPR, including the maven module name have been renamed to RHQ. So bear make sure you plug your RHQ server with *infinispan-rhq-plugin.jar* instead of infinispan-jopr-plugin.jar