News

ClearNova AJAX platform released as open source

• By ADT Staff
• January 10, 2006

ClearNova is releasing ThinkCAP JX, a visual dev environment for building rich Internet apps with AJAX, as open source. ThinkCAP JX is a RAD platform that combines the power of AJAX, J2EE and open source to enable orgs and their developers to quickly build Web-based apps.

The platform is available for download at www.thinkcap.org. In late February, the project Web site will be the location for community feedback, shared experiences, bug fixes, feature requests and sharing knowledge with other users.

"Our customers, as well as the 750 organizations that downloaded our beta have spoken loud and clear: they want an open-source, royalty-free framework and engine that allows them to fully exploit the collaborative nature of the community and that does not lock them into a proprietary run-time," says Byron Matheson, CEO of ClearNova.

ThinkCAP JX allows Java and 4GL developers to rapidly build apps without having to become JavaScript experts. The platform provides event-driven AJAX dev so developers can code on either the client or the server or both. Because developers can leverage Java to make changes to the user interface, it is easier for them to develop and maintain the application. ThinkCAP JX can also be used to add AJAX functionality to existing Java applications.

The ThinkCAP JX Framework integrates almost 25 open-source frameworks and engines including Struts and Hibernate and provides a seamless framework that ties them all together. It is licensed under the GNU Public License (GPL). For software vendors and other orgs wishing to distribute ThinkCAP JX without having to distribute their source code, a royalty-free commercial ThinkCAP JX license is available for $2,000 per developer. ThinkCAP Workbench, a visual design environment, is available at a $499 subscription price per year and includes documentation and technical support. The Workbench is not required to build apps in the ThinkCAP JX Framework.