- BEA to ship Eclipse-based developer tool
- Regressions challenge launched for Java update
- Are high tech firms denying access to their customers?
- Microsoft readies collaboration technology for software development
- Restlet project awakens in beta release
- Mustang galloping behind schedule
- Microsoft application lifecycle management offering expected
- Visual Basic 9.0 preview offered
- Eclipse shining on mobile apps development
- Oracle's NetBeans commitment in question
January 31, 2006 | Comments: (0)
BEA to ship Eclipse-based developer tool
BEA Systems on Wednesday plans to announce availability of BEA Workshop Studio 3.0, which will serve as the promised Eclipse-based version of BEA's developer tool.
"This is actually our Eclipse-based tool, the core of which comes from our acquisition of M7," last September, said Bill Roth, vice president of BEA's Workshop group.
Another highlight of Workshop Studio 3.0 is support for the EJB3 (Enterprise JavaBeans) specification for object persistence.
"The importance of this [product] is it shows the growing importance of the EJB3 persistence standard. We see Java developers clearly embracing EJB3 as their model of building with server objects," Roth said. "This product gives developers a head start on learning a technology that won't final until Sun [Microsystems] finishes the specs some time later this year."
Also critical to version 3.0 is that it is the first major tool to support the Spring framework, Roth said. "One of the criticisms of J2EE in the past is that it's been too hard to write server-side applications. The Spring framework was a response to that; it's an easy way to write enterprise Java applications using Plain Old Java Objects," or POJOs, Roth said.
The full-featured version of Workshop Studio 3.0 costs $899. Abbreviated versions, lacking functions such as object-relational mapping via Hibernate, are priced at $499.
Posted by Paul Krill on January 31, 2006 02:43 PM
January 31, 2006 | Comments: (0)
Regressions challenge launched for Java update
Sun Microsystems is challenging developers to find regression issues in the planned Mustang release of Java.
The company has launched a contest called the JDK Community Project Mustang Regressions Challenge. Contest entrants earn an opportunity to win an Ultra 20 workstation from Sun.
A regression occurs when a software function works correctly in an earlier version of the software, but works differently and incorrectly in a later version, according to a Sun representative. The contest is focused on functional regressions between J2SE (Java 2 Standard Edition) 5.0 and Java SE 6 (Mustang). By functional regression, Sun means differences in functional operations, such as API methods or supported tools included in the JDK.
Mustang is due for release this fall, after being postponed from a mid-year release that had been planned.
Posted by Paul Krill on January 31, 2006 10:06 AM
January 30, 2006 | Comments: (0)
Are high tech firms denying access to their customers?
Traditionally, reporters try not to complain about how hard their job is. There's a couple of reasons for this. One, unless you're a war correspondent, it isn't really and two, there's something wrong with talking about the process of reporting. It's what you might call inside baseball and nobody much cares.
Nevertheless, I can't let this one go.
I called two giant companies, IBM and Oracle, who will at the drop of a hat tell you about how their products are used by the biggest of the big enterprises.
Fortune 500, that's nothing, we have the Fortune 10, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, they proudly announce.
Unfortunately, if you tell these same high tech companies that you want to talk to one of their giant customers about what they think of their products, suddenly, they're hard to find.
As I said I called IBM and explained my need. Big Blue who will call you if they have a new toner cartridge to announce was suddenly silent. No return phone call.
I called Oracle. After a week of back and forth emails, Oracle has decided "not to participate."
My advice to IT is if you don't already do it, be sure and ask for references. And if you are not able to talk to them without a vendor support person hovering over the phone call, think twice before you commit to their product line.
Posted by Ephraim. Schwartz on January 30, 2006 11:40 AM
January 30, 2006 | Comments: (0)
Microsoft readies collaboration technology for software development
A release candidate of Microsoft's Visual Studio 2005 Team Foundation Server is due to be completed on Friday, Microsoft's S. "Soma" Somasegar, corporate vice president of the Microsoft Developer Division, said on Monday at the VSLive! conference in San Francisco.
Team Foundation Server will provide collaboration functions for the Visual Studio 2005 Team System application lifecycle management platform. Microsoft release candidates are considered to be versions of a software product that are just about ready to be shipped, with the company seeking out more feedback just prior to a general release.
Microsoft plans to ship the general release of Team Foundation Server in March, Somasegar said. The company has been pledging a first-quarter 2006 release.
VSLive! attendees will receive copies of the release candidate.
(By Paul Krill, reporting from VSLive!)
Posted by Paul Krill on January 30, 2006 10:32 AM
January 27, 2006 | Comments: (0)
Restlet project awakens in beta release
The Restlet open source project, which is intended to deliver REST (Representational State Transfer) capabilities to Java developers, is now available in a version 1.0 beta release, according to project founder Jerome Louvel, of Noelios Consulting.
REST often has been seen as an alternative to SOAP-based Web services. The Restlet framework now enters a phase of code stabilization, bug fixing and minor enhancements, Louvel said in an email. A final production-ready version is due in the second quarter of this year.
Featured in the project is the Noelios Restlet Engine, which is now automatically registered with the Restlet API if no other implementation is specified. The API itself has been simplified in the beta release.
Also highlighted in the beta version is complete support for cookies and refactored connectors, including the HTTP client and servers.
Posted by Paul Krill on January 27, 2006 08:13 AM
January 25, 2006 | Comments: (0)
Mustang galloping behind schedule
The planned "Mustang" release of Java is being postponed from mid-2006 to autumn of this year, according to a Sun Microsystems blogger.
Officially known as Java Standard Edition 6, or Java SE 6, changes to Mustang's classloader have been made that will require significant work by Sun's engineering team; hence, the postponement, said Ray Gans, a senior program manager at Sun. The added time also gives an opportunity for an exhaustive beta cycle.
"At this time, all the expected Mustang features are nearly complete," Gans wrote. "The next step is massive testing and targeted bug fixing on all levels."
Some major themes that have been cited for Mustang are compatability and stability, ease of development, XML and Web services. A second beta of Mustang is anticipated this summer.
Following Mustang, the Dolphin version of Java is expected to be opened up as a project this spring and ship in 2008. Native XML support has been eyed as a key feature planned for Dolphin. Enhanced support for scripting languages also has been pondered.
Posted by Paul Krill on January 25, 2006 04:02 PM
January 25, 2006 | Comments: (0)
Microsoft application lifecycle management offering expected
It appears Microsoft may be about ready to ship the collaboration component of its Visual Studio 2005 Team System platform for application lifecycle management.
A Microsoft representative on Wednesday said that Team System will be the focus of a keynote speech next Monday by S. "Soma" Somasegar, corporate vice president of the Developer Division at Microsoft, at the VSLive! conference in San Francisco.
The company shipped Visual Studio 2005 Team System in November, but held back on the collaboration component, called Visual Studio 2005 Team Foundation Server, to subject it to more testing. Team Foundation Server will provide functions such as the ability to check out bugs and do reports.
Team Foundation Server is on target to ship this quarter, according to Microsoft's representative. While she did acknowledge the company can be expected to make announcements pertaining to Team System at the show, she could not be specific about what the announcements would be.
But it does seem obvious that the company will take the wrapping off of Team Foundation Server.
Posted by Paul Krill on January 25, 2006 03:02 PM
January 24, 2006 | Comments: (0)
Visual Basic 9.0 preview offered
Microsoft this week released a new Community Technology Preview of the planned Visual Basic 9.0 programming language, featuring XML integration and DLinq functionality, for querying over relational stores.
"VB 9.0 offers language extensions to support data-intensive programming in a unified way, i.e. creating, updating and querying relational databases, XML documents and object graphs," said S. "Soma" Somasegar, corporate vice president of Microsoft's Developer Division, in his blog.
"The relationship between database programming and Visual Basic has always been a powerful one, but Visual Basic 9.0 takes it to a new level by unifying access to data independent of its source," Somasegar said.
The CTP is available by clicking here. The Visual Studio 2005 platform is necessary to use the CTP.
Posted by Paul Krill on January 24, 2006 02:24 PM
January 23, 2006 | Comments: (0)
Eclipse shining on mobile apps development
Eyeing the mobile application space, the Eclipse Foundation on Tuesday is expected to add two open source tools projects to its Device Software Development Platform.
The organization is likely to approve of the Mobile Tools for Java and Native Application Builder projects as part of Eclipse's "creation reviews" process, said Mike Milinkovich, executive director of Eclipse.
Mobile Tools for Java is focused on providing tools for the Micro Edition of Java, Milinkovich said. This effort is being led by Nokia. Applications would be deployed on devices such as cell phones.
Native Application Builder, led by Fujitsu, is about building tools and a GUI builder to function with the Multiplatform Widget Toolkit. This toolkit is a C- and C++-based platform for building runtime GUIs for mobile devices, Milinkovich said.
"[Native Application Builder is] being led by a team from Japan and we're extending the Eclipse community internationally," Milinkovich said. "We think that international growth is important not just for Eclipse but for open source in general."
Native Application Builder and Mobile Tools for Java highlight the mobile space as a growth area, Milinkovich stressed.
"Both of these [projects] are focused on mobile. Obviously, mobile is an area of large growth within the software industry. More and more applications are doing mobile enablement as a key part of their strategy," said Milinkovich.
Toolkits resulting from the two projects would function with the Eclipse IDE. Developers are expected to monetize their use of the toolkits by selling devices with applications resulting from the Eclipse technology.
Posted by Paul Krill on January 23, 2006 02:32 PM
January 20, 2006 | Comments: (0)
Oracle's NetBeans commitment in question
Oracle appears to be taking a don't-call-me, I'll-call-you approach to the Sun Microsystems-led NetBeans open source tools initiative.
In a joint presentation featuring Oracle and Sun Microsystems on January 10, Oracle acknowledged the importance of NetBeans, something that Sun officials were quick to herald. But that endorsement, however, does not necessarily mean Oracle has any plans to develop anything based on NetBeans.
FWIW, there seems to be some confusion as to what exactly Oracle's endorsement means, if anything.
Sun President Jonathan Schwartz in his blog this week champions Oracle's backing of NetBeans.
"We also announced Oracle's adoption and endorsement of NetBeans - building on the groundswell of support we're seeing for NetBeans 5.0," Schwartz said.
But Oracle's Thomas Kurian, who is senior vice president of server technologies at the company, dismissed the notion that Oracle has any concrete plans for NeBeans.
"We certainly think Sun's NetBeans initiative is important in the marketplace, and we're watching it very closely. But as of right now, Oracle is focused on JDeveloper and Eclipse and we have no plans to adopt either NetBeans or any of its technology. Any statements to the contrary by anyone else in the industry are not true," Kurian said in an entry on Oracle's Web site this week
An Oracle representative on Friday reiterated that Oracle is watching NetBeans closely but is focused on the rival Eclipse open source tools initiative as well as on Oracle's own JDeveloper Java tool.
Asked last week what exactly were Oracle's plans for NetBeans, Timothy Cramer, director of the NetBeans program at Sun, said the companies were exploring what Oracle might do with NetBeans.
Right now, it appears Oracle's NetBeans endorsement may not mean much after all.
In another development in open source, a project called the AJAX Toolkit Framework (ATF) is cited on Eclipse's Web site. AJAX (Asynchronous JavaScript plus XML) is gathering steam as a technology for building Web applications.
The IBM-led effort at Eclipse purports to "provide extensible frameworks and exemplary tools for building IDEs for the many different AJAX runtime offerings (Dojo, Zimbra, etc) in the market."
Posted by Paul Krill on January 20, 2006 04:23 PM
January 20, 2006 | Comments: (0)
Macromedia's, er, Abode's Internet apps platform advances
Having completed its merger with Macromedia, Adobe within a few weeks is set to release a public beta version of its Flex 2.0 rich Internet application development technology. Flex also will begin bearing the Adobe name.
With the upcoming release of Flex, Adobe is looking to expand the user base from its present installed base of 5,000 to 10,000 users to 1 million developers in a few years, said David Mendels, senior vice president of enterprise and developer business at Adobe. The company plans to do this by separating the Flex tool and framework from Macromedia server technology and allowing deployments on any J2EE or .Net server.
"We're server-agnostic," said Mendels, who moves over to Adobe from Macromedia. Adobe held a party at the former Macromedia offices in San Francisco on Thursday evening to tout the merger and its resulting products.
Flex 2.0 features improved performance, a new IDE based on the Eclipse platform and new licensing options.
Asked about the burgeoning AJAX (Asynchronous JavaScript plus XML) for rich Internet application development, Adobe officials described Flex 2.0 as similar but more powerful than AJAX.
"It's the same model," as AJAX, Mendels said.
Flex 2.0 already has been available in a less-developed alpha release. The general release is set for the first half of this year. Flex applications use Adobe's ubiquitous Adobe Flash technology on the client side.
-- By Paul Krill, reporting from Adobe's party.
Posted by Tom Sullivan on January 20, 2006 10:41 AM
January 19, 2006 | Comments: (0)
Legal experts say lawsuit against Apple is not a far-fetched possibility
After being called stupid, ignorant, ill-informed and a journalist who lacks integrity following my blog post "Is the MacIntel box exposing Apple to a restraint of trade lawsuit?" it is nice to get two reasonable comments from people with some legal expertise. As it turns out these two do not think a lawsuit is far-fetched.
To recap, in the blog, I had the nerve to quote an industry analyst, Nathan Brookwood, principal at Insight 64, who suggested that Apple may be opening itself up to a law suit if it refused to offer OEM agreements to PC makers for OS X.
Below are two sane responses from readers. They are certainly worth considering:
"Only one clarification to the many comments on antitrust and Apple's market share %. As per my Business Law classes, in bringing actions for antitrust, the government has a great deal of flexibility in defining the "market" that the anti-competitive behavior impacts. Such as "computer workstations used for prepress activities in the Northeast", thus traditional market share estimates rarely define "monopolies".
Posted by: Marti Green at January 18, 2006 04:05 PM
"Nathan Brookwood is specifically talking about a Supreme Court precedent called Digidyne v. Data General. The Supreme Court let a 9th circuit decision stand. The case is interesting both by its potential reach and because it was seen as an anti-business decision at the time.
"The basic case was that Digidyne wanted Data General to license its NOVA oper-ating system called RDOS to Digidyne's clone of a DG NOVA Mainframe. Data General refused and was eventually forced into licensing the OS software because it was ruled that restricting the license to only DG hardware was an illegal tying arrangement.
"This seems like it might very well apply to Apple in the case of OS X on x86 hardware. But if you read the ruling you will see that any equipment manufacturer would have to overcome some pretty substantial obstacles to get the same ruling.
"First, DG lost because RDOS was the only viable operating system software for NOVA and any clones. There was no other reasonable OS available for the clone makers. Dell can hardly claim the same considering that they currently ship both Windows and Linux. Claiming that those two OS's are not "uniquely desirable by buyers" would be a stretch.
"To quote the 9th circuit decision: "Although expressing some doubt as to the sufficiency of the evidence, the district court assumed defendant's RDOS was supe-rior to competing operating systems and was viewed as uniquely desirable by buy-ers. 529 F. Supp. at 816.We do not share the court's hesitancy about the adequacy of the proof of the strong preference of many customers for RDOS. It was a most popular product."
"Even DG admitted that there was no viable alternative. Again from the record, "the only full service operating system available for the NOVA."
"Second, the court determined that to recreate RDOS would be prohibitively expensive and probably not practical. Again, with Linux and other free operating sys-tem software readily available, it is hard to believe that the courts would come to the same conclusion in the case of Apple and OS X.
"So Nathan, if you would care to follow up, how do you defend your supposition that Apple will be forced through this case to untie OS X from Apple hardware?
Posted by: James Bailey at January 18, 2006 03:10 PM
I rest my case with only this additional comment.
I never quite understand why people who use Apple, with the exception of me. I have one at home, get so hot under the collar when someone suggests the world of Apple is not all peaches and cream.
-- Ephraim Schwartz
Posted by Ephraim. Schwartz on January 19, 2006 01:58 PM
January 19, 2006 | Comments: (0)
Web services market consolidation continues
Consolidation in the Web services management market clearly has arrived.
Progress Software on Thursday announced its planned $32 million acquisition of Actional, which would become part of Progress's Sonic Software business unit. Sonic has specialized in enterprise service bus (ESB) technology.
"[The acquisition] brings together two really important categories of software, mainly ESB and Web services management technology," said Hub Vandervoort, Sonic CTO.
The deal comes just 10 days after Mercury Interactive announced plans to acquire Systinet, which also has offered Web services management capabilities. In both acquisitions, companies are seeking to leverage the transition to SOA by enterprises.
The deal makes "a ton of sense for Progress," given Progress's ownership of Sonic, said analyst Ronald Schmelzer, of ZapThink, in an email.
"Their ESB product has an ever-increasing footprint and [a] goal to provide as complete as possible infrastructure for running and managing SOA implementations. As such, one of the missing components of their runtime infrastructure was active management as well as more robust security. This is where Actional comes in," Schmelzer said.
"On another note, I think this is a foreboding note for other startups in the industry. It's becoming increasingly difficult to be a small Web Services or SOA-focused startup/pure-play. The larger vendors know that they have to have a comprehensive answer to SOA challenges," Schmelzer said.
"Small companies will either be directly in the competitive path of these large vendors or will be acquisition fodder. Faced with the prospects of competing with much larger vendors, we believe that many will choose acquisition instead of trying to broaden their own capabilities or find deeper pockets. 2006 will bear out to be the year of super-consolidation for the SOA markets," said Schmelzer.
The marriage between Sonic and Actional could have some complications, however. Sonic previously has partnered with another Web services management vendor, AmberPoint.
Sonic has in fact partnered with both AmberPoint and Actional, but it is likely that AmberPoint may begin to distance itself from Sonic, Vandervoort said. But that would be AmberPoint's choice, he said.
Actional already has had partners that also have been competitors, said David Gehringer, Actional vice president of product of marketing. He cited Cisco Systems as one example. "Yet, we've had a very fruitful partnership with them," Gehringer said.
Posted by Paul Krill on January 19, 2006 10:21 AM
January 17, 2006 | Comments: (0)
Is the MacIntel box exposing Apple to a restraint of trade lawsuit?
Windows Can't Run On MacIntel Platforms;
OS X Can't Run On Non-MacIntel Platforms
I had an interesting conversation with Nathan Brookwood, one of the premier independent chip analysts and principal at Insight 64.
Brookwood explained why we won't see Mac OS X on a commodity PC or Windows on a Mac anytime soon.
Here's how Brookwood put it:
"Although Apple now uses standard Intel processors and chipsets, standard ATI Radeon graphics controllers, and standard USB, SATA and PCI-Express buses, the new Macs differ from Windows-based PC's in one key regard, firmware.
"For several years, Intel has encouraged PC OEMs to adopt a new firmware environment dubbed the "Extensible Firmware Interface (EFI)" but inertia keeps BIOS in the driver's seat.
"Apple, with no x86 legacy concerns, opted for the newer, more flexible EFI approach. Tiger uses EFI to start up on x86 machines, and since Wintel boxes lack EFI, they cannot run Tiger.
"Conversely, Windows needs BIOS to get started, and since MacIntel boxes lack BIOS, they cannot run Windows.
"These different firmware environments will separate MacOS and Windows environments almost as effectively as instruction set architecture did when Macintosh software ran only on PowerPC chips."
Even if you solve the booting problem there are other things hidden in there which would preclude running OS X on a PC, according to Brookwood's conversation with an Apple tech.
As true as that might be, Brookwood also believes that Apple may open itself for a lawsuit if a PC vendors requests an OEM agreement from Apple for its operating system.
If Dell wanted to offer one of their boxes running Mac software they could of course just buy the packaged OS. However, if they wanted to purchase OS X on an OEM basis and were turned down, Brookwood believes this could be grounds for the suit.
The suit could contend that Apple controls 100 percent of the Apple compatible hardware market and therefore it is anti-competitive.
-- Ephraim Schwartz
Editor-at-Large
Posted by Ephraim. Schwartz on January 17, 2006 01:41 PM
January 13, 2006 | Comments: (0)
NetBeans 5.0 moves closer to release
NetBeans.org plans to release the NetBeans 5.0 open source tools platform on January 31, according to Timothy Cramer, director of NetBeans engineering at Sun Microsystems. Sun sponsors the NetBeans initiative.
A Release Candidate of NetBeans 5.0, serving as a prelude to the general release, was made available this week, Cramer said. The goal of the Release Candidate is to fix any high-priority bugs before the final version comes out.
A highlight of NetBeans 5.0 is the Matisse GUI builder, which provides a drag-and-drop paradigm for building GUIs for Java applications. "It revolutionizes how you do GUI-building," Cramer said.
A GUI-based version control system also is featured, as is the ability to automatically deploy applications to application servers from JBoss and BEA Systems. Version 5.0 also makes it easier to build Web services clients. Refactoring has been enhanced as well.
A Release Candidate for the NetBeans Mobility Pack 5.0 also is available. The Mobility Pack is intended for development of applications for cell phones.
The Mobility Pack will be released simultaneously with NetBeans 5.0, as will the NetBeans Profiler, for optimizing memory and CPU usage in applications.
The Apache Software Foundation, meanwhile, has released the open source Geronimo 1.0 J2EE application server. The software has passed the J2EE Certification Test Suite and is available for download.
Posted by Paul Krill on January 13, 2006 03:00 PM
January 13, 2006 | Comments: (0)
802.11n expected to be approved next week
Mobile Pipeline is reporting that the long awaited 802.11n wireless standard could be approved as soon as next week. 802.11n is a next-generation Wi-Fi standard that could push data speeds to as fast as 240 Mbps and offer increased range.
InfoWorld's Ephraim Schwartz in November wrote about the battle lines being drawn between wireless chip vendors who are tiring of the long wait for ratification of 802.11n. He wrote:
Vendors looking to increase ever-eroding margins on commodity 802.11a, b, and g gear have been pushing for higher speeds and a faster ratification of 802.11n. Tired of the wait, Airgo Networks designed its own 802.11n-like chip set to be used first by Netgear in its RangeMax 240 router, announced last week, which has a maximum performance of 240Mbps.
You can read the full story here.
The 802.11n proposal is being finalized this week and is expected to be sent to the IEEE meeting, taking place in Hawaii starting on January 16. The spec would need a 75 percent majority vote for approval.
Network World wrote about the expected vote on 802.11n earlier this month.
Posted by Cathleen Moore on January 13, 2006 02:25 PM
January 12, 2006 | Comments: (0)
Prior to attending last night's reunion of the four Sun Microsystems co-founders, which is covered in InfoWorld (click here), I pondered characterizing the meeting as the computer industry's version of a Beatles reunion.
However, I thought that might be in bad taste, since two of the Beatles have died. Then, an audience member flat out referred to the four co-founders as the "computing Fab Four," and I figured I was free to make the comparison. (For those of you not familiar with the Beatles, they often were called the Fab Four.)
Now, I'll resist the temptation to partner up each Sun co-founder with a respective Beatle, since whoever gets the Ringo designation might not like it. Not that I don't like Ringo, but he was not the genius songwriter that the other three were.
Anyway, the Sun-Beatles comparison really doesn't work, because while the Beatles were clearly the top pop music act of the 20th century, Sun would vie with other success stories in the computer arena, such as Microsoft. Microsoft's Bill Gates and Paul Allen might be the Fab 2 of computing, for example.
Still, I did get this photo from the Sun reunion for your viewing. Seated from left to right are: Bill Joy, Scott McNealy, Vinod Khosla and Andy Bechtolsheim.
Posted by Paul Krill on January 12, 2006 11:26 AM
January 11, 2006 | Comments: (0)
Microsoft reassures the Apple faithful it will support Office, sort of...
Intel wasn't the only vendor to appear on stage with Steve Jobs at MacWorld this week. Microsoft was there, too.
After announcing late last year that it would no longer support IE on the Mac, they must have felt it good business to have a product manager address the 2,000 plus audience at the keynote to reassure them that Microsoft just signed an "official" agreement, as opposed to an unofficial agreement, that Redmond will continue to support and upgrade Microsoft Office on the Mac for a minimum of five years.
Definitely the low point of Jobs' presentation.
On a personal note, for some strange reason my version of IE on my Mac suddenly got very slow and it crashes a lot. I reread the announcement that Microsoft would no longer support IE on Macs but it didn't say anything about sabotaging my current version. Oh well, must be user error.
Oh, and if you buy a new Mac, you'll get 50 percent off the retail price of Office. But if it is an Intel-based Mac, iMac or MacBook Pro notebook, you will have to run it in emulation under what is called Rosetta.
The question is will Microsoft rewrite Office and create what Apple calls a "universal" application, meaning the same package will run natively on either an Intel or PowerPC based Macintosh.
I have a feeling that will be a long time in coming.
Posted by Ephraim. Schwartz on January 11, 2006 11:53 AM
January 11, 2006 | Comments: (0)
Oracle CEO Larry Ellison and Sun Microsystems Chairman/CEO Scott McNealy preached unity during a joint appearance at Oracle headquaters on Tuesday.
McNealy hailed Oracle's software while Ellison touted Sun's hardware as well as the Java software that Sun has shared with the industry.
But the companies are not on the same page in all instances. Oracle still will work with the Eclipse open source initiative, which Sun is not a part of, and with Linux, which rivals Sun's Solaris OS. And yes, Sun still has an alliance with Microsoft, a company that has been scorned by both Sun and Oracle at various times.
But the meeting did relay the message that the two companies have much common ground. Full coverage of the event can be found here.
Posted by Paul Krill on January 11, 2006 09:58 AM
January 10, 2006 | Comments: (0)
REST (Representational State Transfer), which is viewed as an alternative to SOAP-based Web services, is being tailored for use in Java.
The Restlet open source project, authored by Jerome Louvel, founder of Noelios Consulting, is intended to bring the simplicity and efficiency of REST to Java developers, Louvel said in an email. The project serves as a framework for REST written in Java and is composed of two parts: a neutral Restlet API and a reference implementation called the Noelios Restlet Engine.
The API is an alternative to the Servlet API solving most issues and limitations, according to Louvel. If adopted by developers, the Restlet API will be submitted to the Java community Process or to an organization such as the Apache Software Foundation.
"When I started the development of a new Web site, I looked for a framework that could help me build an application respecting the REST concepts and allowing the maximum scalability," Louvel said. "As I couldn't find a solution, Restlets started as an attempt to build a REST framework on top of the Servlet API. However, Servlets lack clear separation between the transport protocol concerns and the Web application concerns; they have direct control of low-level aspects of HTTP like headers and output stream, which makes it very hard for Servlet engines to optimize and scale applications."
"So, Restlets ended up as a complete alternative to Servlets," Louvel explained. Restlets expose only a REST interface to developers and are protocol-independent, he said. Restlet applications can be client-or server-side or peer-to-peer, Louvel said.
Additionally, Restlet is geared toward Web 2.0 applications. "Restlet is an excellent foundation for Web 2.0 applications because it naturally supports AJAX (Asynchronous JavaScript plus XML), lightweight REST Web services (simple exchange of XML documents via HTTP), RSS feeds, URI as the UI and the refocus on data," Louvel said.
Posted by Paul Krill on January 10, 2006 11:28 AM
January 09, 2006 | Comments: (0)
Google Video Store: We're still closed
Update: They must have heard me, because the "coming soon" message is gone and now there's more content and information on the Video Store. But I don't see the NBA content yet.
Google is still growing into its big corporate shoes.
During the company's much hyped presentation at CES last Friday, the Google Video Store was launched, promising a smorgasbord of TV shows, sports videos, and independent films.
The company did clearly state in its press release that the Video Store would be "available soon," however the tardiness of the store's opening is somewhat of a black eye for Google.
Media coverage of Google's keynote was heavy, not to mention the week of build up and speculation that preceded it. It seems like Google is blowing a major opportunity to capitalize on curious users who have visited the Video Store looking for the new goods. I'm sure that with so many different content partners timing is a difficult thing to peg, but it really does make a difference to kick off a new offering with something to show.
Posted by Cathleen Moore on January 9, 2006 05:15 PM
January 09, 2006 | Comments: (0)
Microsoft looks to improve automation in Visual Studio 2005
Citing its goal of .Net extensibility, Microsoft has released code samples that show how to build macros, add-ins and wizards that boost productivity in Visual Studio 2005.
Samples use the Visual Studio automation model, which can pre-process commands, control build configurations mechanisms, control built-in tools windows and perform several other tasks.
Automation samples, found at this URL, include an Add-Wizard and numerous others.
Posted by Paul Krill on January 9, 2006 04:29 PM
January 09, 2006 | Comments: (0)
ClearNova adds open source to AJAX tool
ClearNova is releasing its ThinkCAP JX (Complete Application Platform AJAX) rapid application development environment on Tuesday and is offering up a piece of it to open source.
Reported in InfoWorld in September, ThinkCAP JX will feature AJAX (Asynchronous JavaScript plus XML) support in the new release. To boost usage, server code for internally deployed applications will be available via open source under the GPL (GNU General Public License). Applications deployed externally, to third parties, will cost $2,000 per developer for server code.
Users still must purchase the ThinkCap workbench for a $499 annual subscription for either internal or external applications. The company had charged a one-time fee of $2,500 per seat previously. "What we're trying to do is we're trying to make the product available to the community, so we want to reach a broader audience," said Byron Matheson, CEO at ClearNova.
In addition to adding AJAX support, the company with ThinkCAP JX is extending the open source Struts framework by allowing developers to use AJAX within Struts. "We actually allow them to reuse what they've already written in Struts," Matheson said.
ThinkCap JX had been due to ship in late-2005, but the company postponed the release to add about 70 additional AJAX components for building rich Internet applications, according to Matheson.
Posted by Paul Krill on January 9, 2006 04:06 PM
January 09, 2006 | Comments: (0)
Mercury buys Systinet for SOA governance
Mercury Interactve on Monday announced its acquisition of Systinet for $105 million in cash.
Systinet's technology for SOA governance and lifecycle management will be combined with Mercury Business Technology Optimization offerings. This is intended to enable customers to take a "lifecycle" approach to optimizing quality, performance and availability of SOA business services.
Key Systinet products include:
* Systinet Registry, which provides a UDDI-compliant registry for managing and publishing business services and other SOA assets.
* Systinet Policy Manager, for developing policies and managing service validation.
The acquisition is expected to close during the first quarter of 2006.
Posted by Paul Krill on January 9, 2006 11:58 AM
January 06, 2006 | Comments: (0)
Early concerns about Google DRM
The announcement hasn't even officially hit the wires yet, but already people are getting anxious about the possible inclusion of proprietary DRM (digital rights management) technology in Google's online video download service expected to be unveiled today at CES.
The Wall Street Journal yesterday reported that Google at CES will launch an update to its video search service, which will allow users to download and view videos and TV programs. Mentioned, innocently, at the end of the story is that Google has developed its own DRM software to protect videos from piracy.
If it proves to be true, it would be a very un-Google-like move.
As many bloggers have been railing about, there is no need for yet another DRM system. Can't wait to find out the details.
Posted by Cathleen Moore on January 6, 2006 03:46 PM
January 06, 2006 | Comments: (0)
BI vendor dumped for Siebel solution. Is this a sign of the times?
Select Comfort, the makers of those sleep number beds you may have seen advertised on TV, is in the process of dumping its pure play BI vendor and deploying a Siebel analytics solution instead.
Select Comfort is a major retailer with 400 stores and $690 million dollars in revenue. So when they make this kind of decision I thought it would be interesting to find out why.
From a technology point of view, Mike Thyken, CIO, ticked off a number of reasons why the company is making the change.
Siebel had by far the best user interface, far simpler to use than the current BI system, Thyken told me.
"We get a sense of what is actually happening at a granular level by drilling down into the data and to do that with the old tool set took a fairly technical person," Thyken said
In addition the Siebel solution is nimble compared to the amount of time it used to take to run a report.
But, beyond that, the decision making process also considered the fact that Oracle is promising the company that the Siebel solution will integrate with its current Oracle CRM and ERP suites.
"If Oracle can take this acquisition and integrate the tool into a prebuilt data warehouse you would have one heck of a powerful and simple way to implement analytics," Thyken said.
The point? Is this the beginning of the end for pure play BI companies? Will analytics be absorbed into the current feature set from all the major enterprise vendors?
Time will tell.
Posted by Ephraim. Schwartz on January 6, 2006 03:05 PM
January 06, 2006 | Comments: (0)
Oracle, Sun to talk about partnership
CEOs from Sun Microsystems and Oracle on Tuesday plan to hold a "Town Hall" session at Oracle headquarters in Redwood Shores, Calif. to discuss the vendors' ongoing partnering plans.
Agenda items for the session, to be hosted by Oracle CEO Larry Ellison and Sun CEO Scott McNealy, include:
* The next phase of the Oracle/Sun alliance, described as a "reinvigorated relationship, not a merger or acquisition."
* The importance of Java and Oracle's commitment to it.
* Recent announcements - Oracle's multi-core pricing strategy.
* Joint marketing efforts to expand adoption of Oracle and Sun technologies.
In recent years, Oracle has been perceived as moving away from close links with Sun to promote use of Oracle software on Intel-Linux systems, which have not been Sun's forte. But the companies recently established closer ties such as Oracle's selection of Sun's Solaris 10 operating environment as Oracle's preferred 64-bit application development and deployment platform. Additionally, Oracle President Charles Phillips participated in the launch of Sun's Sun Fire T1000 and T2000 servers last month, according to an Oracle representative.
Posted by Paul Krill on January 6, 2006 12:55 PM
January 06, 2006 | Comments: (0)
What is the value of a head start in technology? What do you think?
The recent NTP, a patent holding company, patent infringement lawsuit lodged against RIM/BlackBerry is more than likely to be settled.
See my story posted on the InfoWorld site for all the details.
The U.S. patent office has disallowed four of the five main patent disputes and we now have Gartner saying it will take 12-to-18 months before the case is settled, in or out of court.
But the real question is how much does the enterprise value a lead in technology even as its competitors slowly but surely catch up?
I spoke with David Heit, a senior product manager at RIM.
From Heit's perspective the advantage RIM has enjoyed in being able to offer true push email years ahead of anyone else in the industry has a great deal of value going forward, even as competitors begin to offer similar solutions.
While unwilling to admit that RIM's competitors have a push solution equal to RIM, Heit's comments seem to say that the value of its
long-term lead goes beyond the actual technology.
"Push is something all of our competitors have aspired to," Heit tells me, "but RIM has an established solution that has weathered the test of time."
RIM has over 4 million users and relationships with over 130 carriers worldwide.
"RIM technology is well-proven and reliable," Heit says.
Is that enough?
Will the likes of Intellisync, Microsoft, and Good offering similar push technology push RIM out of its leadership position as the premier provider of mobile, wireless email?
It's a question I put to my readers. I'd like to hear from IT folks in the enterprise about the value of longevity and proven reliability versus the value of competitive solutions from established companies that claim to now offer the same capabilities.
Please see the comments space below, let me know what you think and it will be posted.
Thanks.
Posted by Ephraim. Schwartz on January 6, 2006 10:14 AM
January 05, 2006 | Comments: (0)
SOA skepticism subsiding, researcher says
Skepticism over SOA is giving way to adoption, according to IT advisory and research firm Nucleus Research.
The lofty promises of SOA in the areas of enterprise integration and software reusability had fueled this skepticism, Nucleus said in a statement it released about SOA. But implementers now are benefitting from SOA, which Nucleus defines as "the practice of building platform-independent pieces of software that are defined according to a specific business process and readily adapted for reuse."
Implementers leverage SOA to save money, speed up projects and reduce programming costs, Nucleus said.
Reuse of software has been a key benefit. "SOA reuse is now enhanced by the adoption of standards, which in turn enables reuse," according to Nucleus.
An SOA should be business process-driven, focus on reuse, deploy metadata and allow loose coupling via messaging software and metadata, Nucleus said.
Posted by Paul Krill on January 5, 2006 04:46 PM
January 05, 2006 | Comments: (0)
Apple lets slip a couple Macworld secrets (maybe)
An observant MacRumors forum hound spotted what may be two new product announcements slated for next week's Macworld Expo.
On Apple's iLife GarageBand Web page this morning, a link to something called iWeb was featured, as well as a link to iLife 06 features. This blog has a screen capture of the two product mentions, which Apple has since taken down from its site.
An update to the current iLife '05 isn't unexpected, but the mysterious iWeb is piquing much curiosity. The MacRumors forum is rife with speculation that it could be a Web authoring tool, a WYSIWYG blogging tool, or a Front Page-type application. But all that really is just speculation. Who Knows? With a name as bland as iWeb, the door is wide open.
Posted by Cathleen Moore on January 5, 2006 12:58 PM
January 05, 2006 | Comments: (0)
Microsoft enhancing Project application
Microsoft is offering a tool enabling users of the Microsoft Office Project 2003 project management package to develop and update PowerPoint 2003 presentations.
The Microsoft Office Project 2003 Project Presentation Add-in is available as a free download. Users can build and update PowerPoint 2003 presentations with real-time project data, thus eliminating redundant data entry and potential clerical errors, according to a Microsoft representative.
The add-in works with Microsoft Office 2003 and requires Project 2003 and PowerPoint 2003.
Posted by Paul Krill on January 5, 2006 11:16 AM
January 03, 2006 | Comments: (0)
Software architecture management company Lattix has become the latest vendor to join the Eclipse Foundation for open source tools.
The company on Tuesday said it would enable its Lightweight Dependency Models (LDM) technology to control the architecture of Eclipse-based software projects. LDM is a product that uses a dependency structure matrix for representing an entire system. The Design Rules technology in LDM enables automated enforcement of subsystem interdependencies.
"What we do with Eclipse is now we're able to run this application within [the Eclipse IDE]," said Neeraj Sangal, president and founder of Lattix.
As an Add-Provider member of Eclipse, Lattix must commit to providing a commercial software offering based on Eclipse within a year, according to Eclipse. Lattix in two weeks plans to roll out enterprise and community versions of its LDM product as well as a plug-in to link them to the Eclipse IDE. The free, community edition will offer representations of a software system but lack the ability to designate rules, a function offered in the enterprise version.
Posted by Paul Krill on January 3, 2006 04:32 PM
January 03, 2006 | Comments: (0)
The Los Angeles Times is reporting that Google is in whispered negotiations with Wal-Mart to sell a low-price Google PC.
According to the Times, the Internet-connected device would run an OS created by Google, not Microsoft's Windows, and would be priced as low as $200. The OS would probably be a Google-flavored version of Linux.
Some are theorizing that Google Co-Founder and President of Products Larry Page's CES keynote in Las Vegas on Friday might be the launch pad.
If this comes to pass, I wonder if it will relate at all to Google's disappointing partnership announcement with Sun Microsystems. In the build up to that collaboration, many observers theorized that Google might be prepping a service version of Sun's StarOffice productivity suite. If a Google branded PC does surface, maybe StarOffice, or the open-source OpenOffice suite, will have its day after all.
Posted by Cathleen Moore on January 3, 2006 10:54 AM
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