I have tried to address the shortcomings of the current JBoss init script for RHEL5:

• Uses PID file
• Supports chkconfig
• Supports start, stop, force-stop, reload, force-reload, status
• Supports custom user and password on shutdown
• Supports custom jndi host/port on shutdown
• Does not allow second instance to start when one is already running
• Does not rely on other files such as run.sh and run.conf
• Verifies successful startup
• The init script does not have to be edited, use the standard location for configuration (/etc/default/jboss) instead
• Runs out of the box when no configuration is provided
• Should support most Linuces

All feedback is welcome – I'm sure I forgot something in the provided script

The init script is currently maintained at http://code.google.com/p/jboss-rpm/source/browse/#svn/trunk/src/main/etc

(This issue was copied from JBPAPP-3194 as suggested by Fernando Nasser)