Columns
Product Briefs
- By ADT Staff
- September 30, 2002
Business Development Suite 3.50
Four
J's Development Tools has released Business Development Suite (BDS) 3.50. The
new version provides Web services client and server support across operating
environments from PDAs to Unix workstations.
The development environment includes a set of tools to help build scalable
Web services servers. The product is said to help companies use the business
logic in their existing applications by opening them up to other applications
and the Web. Through Web services, BDS applications can communicate directly
with programs written in such languages as Java, C# and VisualBasic.NET. With
the product, server-side WSDL files can be generated automatically from business
logic. Also, client-side applications can automatically generate the business
logic to access server-side Web services from a WSDL file.
BDS is priced at $5,000 per developer seat. The company also offers a $400
end-user runtime rate.
Four J's Development Tools, Bath, U.K., www.fourjs.com
BPML 1.0
The Business Process Management Initiative has
released BPML 1.0. The BPML specification defines a formal model for expressing
abstract and executable processes that address many aspects of enterprise
business processes and also provides a grammar in the form of an XML Schema for
enabling the persistence and interchange of process definitions across
heterogeneous systems and modeling tools.
BPML 1.0 works with the Web Service Choreography Interface (WSCI)
specification developed by BEA Systems, Intalio, SAP AG and Sun Microsystems.
These two specs together are said to provide an end-to-end view that depicts the
role of each individual business process and the business activities performed
by each role. This is said to assist business analysts and software engineers in
collaborating on modeling processes. BPML 1.0 was developed as a semantic
superset of previous releases of the BPML specification, as well as the WSFS
specification developed by IBM and the XLANG specification developed by
Microsoft.
The BPML 1.0 specification is available for download royalty-free from
BPMI.org's Web site at www.bpmi.org/bpml-spec.esp.
The
Business Process Management Initiative, Denver, Colo., www.bpmi.org
WebInspect 2.5
SPI Dynamics has released WebInspect 2.5,
an assessment product that adapts to various enterprise environments. The
product's Adaptive-Agent technology lets users perform security assessments on
Web-enabled applications, and has specific assessment capabilities for IBM
WebSphere, Lotus Domino, Oracle Application Servers and MacroMedia
ColdFusion.
The Adaptive-Agent technology enables the product to perform intelligent
application-level security checks. As a user initiates an assessment, WebInspect
assigns Assessment Agents that dynamically catalog the Web app. As these agents
complete the assessment, findings are reported back to a main security engine
that analyzes the results. WebInspect then launches Threat Agents to evaluate
the gathered information and apply attack algorithms to determine what
vulnerabilities exist and the severity of those vulnerabilities.
In addition, the product is said to save users time in assessing their Web
applications, contain the latest security vulnerability and assessment
technology, enable users to perform security assessments for any Web
application, and have advanced executive-level reporting functionality.
Pricing for WebInspect 2.5 is $4,995 per server, with a yearly maintenance
fee thereafter. A free 15-day trial copy of the product can be downloaded from
the company's Web site.
SPI Dynamics Inc., Atlanta, Ga., www.spidynamics.com
RetrievalWare 7.0
Convera's RetrievalWare 7.0 combines
multimedia and cross-lingual search capabilities in a single product.
RetrievalWare delivers a higher level of interoperability with enterprise
applications using XML and is said to provide easy integration into the
Microsoft .NET environment. The product also allows user information to be
stored in an existing LDAP directory.
Version 7.0 supports multilevel categories and taxonomies, and enables large,
multinational companies, government and financial organizations to search and
categorize across many types of document repositories and multimedia objects in
many languages. Users can also search, retrieve, categorize and view video
files, as well as more than 200 proprietary document formats from a single user
interface.
Convera, Vienna, Va., www.convera.com
MetaBase 2.1
MetaMatrix has released Version 2.1 of
MetaBase, an enterprise meta data management system, and the MetaMatrix
Information Integration Server. The two products are said to simplify the
construction of model-driven architectures for information integration.
MetaMatrix 2.1 introduces features that are said to ensure interoperability,
promote enterprise-wide information visibility and increase application
development efficiency. New enhancements allow users to search and browse meta
data models, analyze the effects of changing any element within an environment,
import and export complete interrelated model sets, and build transformation
queries.
An evaluation download of MetaMatrix 2.1 is available at www.metamatrix.com.
MetaMatrix, New
York, N.Y., www.metamatrix.com
RTPatch Pro for Windows Version 6.5
Pocket Soft has
released Version 6.5 of RTPatch Pro for Windows, which includes 20 new features,
22 new commands, support for Netscape 6 and a VB.NET example with source
code.
One new feature, Client Management Aid, is a patch logging mechanism and
report tool that allows RTPatch developers and end users to identify which
patches have been applied and when they were applied.
Other features include an extended Client API that gives users greater
control over the update process for a more customizable end-user experience, and
new parameters that allow developers to redirect a user's browser depending on
the result of the patch application. In addition, a new patch application option
lets developers create a log file, add a bitmap to be displayed during patching
and optionally hide the main EZPatch window.
Pocket Soft, Houston, Texas, www.pocketsoft.com
Cypress Publishing Factory
Cypress Publishing Factory,
from Cypress Corp., is an end-to-end content assembly and delivery solution that
captures and aggregates content created by ERP, CRM and other enterprise apps,
and then delivers it to any destination across the enterprise and to the
Web.
The product is said to enable corporations to capture year-end statements
from multiple applications; create new document packages for all customers;
automatically insert targeted marketing messages; bundle marketing messages by
customer, location and fiscal status; and deliver these messages simultaneously
to a production printer, e-mail boxes and the Web.
Cypress Corp., Rochester
Hills, Mich., www.cypressdelivers.com
Foglight for the Oracle E-Business Suite
Foglight for
the Oracle E-Business Suite, from Quest Software Inc., provides
application-centric monitoring, diagnostics and transaction monitoring to track
the health and response times of components within a company's Oracle E-Business
application.
The product also guides IT professionals from an application service alert to
the problematic application server, Web server or database server, and then to
the actual transactions executing on those servers. Quest's OnWire, a
transaction response time monitor, captures and analyzes all Oracle E-Business
transactions maintaining information such as response time, original user, form,
module and SQL to pinpoint the source of the problem.
Quest Software Inc.,
Irvine, Calif., www.quest.com
DbCAD dev, DbGIS dev and DbMAP Internet Server
ABACO
has launched DbCAD dev, DbGIS dev and DbMAP Internet Server.
DbCAD dev is a component library that unifies raster/vector and database
functions. It supports such file formats as AutoCAD DWG/DXF, ESRI SHP,
MicroStation DGN, TIFF, JPG and BMP. The product also displays drawings, maps
and images simultaneously with unlimited dimensions.
In addition to all the functions of DbCAD dev, DbGIS dev supports GeoTIFF
24-bit file formats, excluding LZW compression, and includes SHP, MrSID and ECW
drivers. It also provides boolean operations between polygons, spatial analysis
and raster tassellation and transparency.
DbMAP Internet Server is based on client/server architecture for the
development and distribution of GIS apps and data, and uses a scalable system to
design intranet/Internet solutions.
ABACO, Mantova, Italy, www.abacogroup.com
e-Merchandising System (EMS)
FinanCenter has released
e-Merchandising System (EMS), a new Web site personalization engine.
EMS employs interactive personal finance tools that engage customers while
capturing key profile data. The product then analyzes this data and responds
with targeted, relevant content.
With EMS, authorized users access setup and maintenance features through a
standard Web browser (IE 4.0 and above) and follow EMS smart wizards that guide
the process of defining target audiences, determining content type and
placement, inserting the content and scheduling its deployment. EMS is TRUSTe
privacy certified and is also fully compliant with Gramm-Leach-Bliley privacy
laws and P3P-imposed practices.
FinanCenter, Tucson, Ariz., www.financenter.com
IntaSpaces
IntaSpaces, from IntaMission, enables
businesses to keep their distributed systems running while changes are made to
enterprise applications and services.
The product targets globally active companies that run multiple applications
and services across widely distributed networks of diverse and varying systems.
IntaSpaces' architecture and design are said to make complex tasks simple,
allowing businesses to expand existing operations while managing costs,
increasing productivity and bringing new services to customers
faster.
IntaSpaces, Windsor, U.K., www.intamission.com
CrossOver Office
CodeWeavers Inc. has released
CrossOver Office, a software solution that allows enterprise-level Linux users
to install and operate Microsoft Office and Lotus Notes on their PCs without the
Windows operating system.
CrossOver Office eliminates the need for both a Microsoft Windows OS license
and a Windows emulator when running Microsoft Office or Lotus Notes in Linux.
With the product, users can go directly to Notes or Office, speeding deployment
and improving the user experience.
The product is priced at $54.95 per user.
CodeWeavers Inc., St. Paul,
Minn., www.codeweavers.com
RichPayments on First Data Merchant Services
(FDMS)
RichSolutions Inc. has released RichPayments on First Data
Merchant Services (FDMS) South Platform. RichPayments is said to enable
merchants to securely process payments in retail, e-commerce and wireless
industries over the Internet, resulting in five-second or less transaction
times.
RichPayments has been designed to support a range of needs from standalone
merchants, multilane retail outlets and online merchants operating their own Web
sites to large Internet service providers hosting multiple merchant sites. The
product is said to provide businesses with faster transaction processing,
seamless updates, cross-platform support and enhanced security.
RichSolutions
Inc., Redmond, Wash., www.richsolutions.com
NeuArchitect 4.0
NeuVis Software, acquired by
Rational Software in August, has released NeuArchitect 4.0. The latest release
features new design, construction and integration capabilities that are said to
increase developer productivity, speed product knowledge transfer and leverage
products that support key parts of the application development life cycle,
including Rational Rose and IBM WebSphere Studio Application Developer.
Version 4.0 provides developers with a model-driven development environment
for creating Web services, XML, Web and wireless applications. From these
models, NeuArchitect's code construction system creates executable e-business
apps, including presentation, interaction, business object and database layers,
for deployment on all leading deployment platforms.
Other features include more than 70 extensible and customizable code
templates, and support for BEA WebLogic Web services and HP application
server.
Neuvis Software, Shelton, Conn., www.neuvis.com