title: Some questions about Websphere session management stratagy and session related content in Servlet 2.3 specification
body: <p>In documentation <a href="http://pic.dhe.ibm.com/infocenter/wasinfo/v8r5/topic/com.ibm.websphere.nd.doc/ae/cprs_plan_cluster.html" rel="nofollow">Websphere Application Server Information Center - Clustered session support</a>, it says </p>
  
  <blockquote>
    <p>The session management facility <strong>requires an affinity mechanism</strong> so that all requests for a particular session are directed to the same
    application server instance in the cluster. This requirement conforms
    to the <strong>Servlet 2.3 specification</strong> in that multiple requests for a
    session cannot coexist in multiple application servers.</p>
  </blockquote>
  
  <p>Does it mean Websphere can only support sticky session(session affinity) mechanism? If not, how to config on Websphere to support non-sticky session stratage?</p>
  
  <p>And In  <a href="http://download.oracle.com/otn-pub/jcp/7840-servlet-2.3-spec-oth-JSpec/servlet-2_3-fcs-spec.pdf?AuthParam=1388998140_9a869ba45675b87e7c5a64bf4e340947" rel="nofollow">Servlet 2.3 specification, SRV.7.7.2 Distributed Environments 
  </a> </p>
  
  <blockquote>
    <p>Within an application marked as
    distributable, all requests that are part of a session must handled by
    one virtual machine at a time.</p>
  </blockquote>
  
  <p>Based on this specification, it supposes that we should follow this rule, but we can use non-sticky session stratage on <strong>Apache + Tomcat cluster</strong>, doesn't it break the rule?</p>
  
  <p>Any response is appreciated.</p>