Based on experimentation with the RC5 stateful_deployment_descriptor tutorial, I have determined the following:

The absence of <assembly-descriptor/> in ejb-jar.xml causes the remove-method to not take effect, meaning calls to the bean after invoking the method designated as the remove-method do not throw EJBNoSuchObjectException (or any other Exception, for that matter).

If <assembly-descriptor/> is present, we get proper behavior. Problem is, assembly-descriptor is not a required element.

I have seen this behavior consistent with both the RC5 stateful_deployment_descriptor tutorial, running it as-is, as well as with my own example based on it, in which I have reflected the current XMLSchema definition of remove-method in my ejb-jar.xml file. That is:

<code>
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!-- from the tutorial -->
<ejb-jar version="3.0">
<description>JBoss Stateful Session Bean Tutorial</description>
<display-name>JBoss Stateful Session Bean Tutorial</display-name>
<enterprise-beans>
<session>
<ejb-name>ShoppingCart</ejb-name>
<remote>org.jboss.tutorial.stateful_deployment_descriptor.bean.ShoppingCart</remote>
<ejb-class>org.jboss.tutorial.stateful_deployment_descriptor.bean.ShoppingCartBean</ejb-class>
<session-type>Stateful</session-type>
<transaction-type>Container</transaction-type>
<remove-method>
<bean-method>
<method-name>checkout</method-name>
</bean-method>
</remove-method>
</session>
</enterprise-beans>
<!--
<assembly-descriptor>
</assembly-descriptor> -->
</ejb-jar>
</code>

yields the same behavior as:

<code>
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!-- using the current XMLSchema definition, which deploys fine (and is XMLSchema valid) -->
<ejb-jar version="3.0"
xmlns="http://java.sun.com/xml/ns/javaee"
xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
xsi:schemaLocation="http://java.sun.com/xml/ns/javaee
http://java.sun.com/xml/ns/javaee/ejb-jar_3_0.xsd">

<enterprise-beans>
<session>
<ejb-name>ShoppingCart</ejb-name>
<remote>org.jboss.tutorial.stateful_deployment_descriptor.bean.ShoppingCart</remote>
<ejb-class>org.jboss.tutorial.stateful_deployment_descriptor.bean.ShoppingCartBean</ejb-class>
<session-type>Stateful</session-type>
<remove-method>
<bean-method>
<method-name>checkout</method-name>
</bean-method>
<retain-if-exception>false</retain-if-exception>
</remove-method>
<transaction-type>Container</transaction-type>
</session>
</enterprise-beans>

<!-assembly-descriptor/->

</ejb-jar>
</code>