WebSphere Studio update supports deeper Eclipse support

• By Jack Vaughan
• October 7, 2002

[PROGRAMMERS REPORT, OCTOBER 8, 2002] -- IBM recently updated its flagship development tool suite, formerly known as VisualAge and now dubbed WebSphere Studio, with a significant number of enhancements. WebSphere Studio V.5 supports Version 2.0 of the open-source Eclipse tools plug-in IDE, Version 1.3 of the J2EE standard, and Version 1.4 of the Sun JDK. The tool set offers enhancements to developers spanning Cobol and 4GL jobs, to Java and Apache efforts.

In fact, the tool set supports the emerging Apache Strut framework for implementing Web apps using a model-view-controller, said Bernie Spang, director of WebSphere Studio marketing. ''We introduced visual tools for laying out your Web app, using the Struts framework, as a flow among JSPs and action nodes,'' he said.

Eclipse support means developers can use the tools they like, said Spang. Meanwhile, their managers can trust that they can optimize team productivity with a single development environment, he suggested.

Eclipse is something of an intelligent API engine. To support it, IBM had to significantly rewrite its tools infrastructure, but the company anticipates a big payoff.

''In the 10 months since we launched it, the grassroots and vendor support has exceeded expectations,'' said Spang. ''The motivation behind it for us is that Eclipse enables us to integrate not only Java, Web and Cobol tools, but also all of our middleware and voice environment plug-ins.

''Eclipse as an API engine'' is an incomplete analogy, suggests Spang. ''The APIs for plugging into the tools platform and leveraging services are open not just to the definitions, but also to the actual code. We did it to rapidly grow the ecosystems of tools for developers,'' he said.

Links:
''Promoting shared software through Eclipse'' by Dwight Deugo at http://www.adtmag.com/article.asp?id=6748

For other Programmer Report articles, please go to http://www.adtmag.com/article.asp?id=6265