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Three software packages slated to ship in June 1997 from Visual Edge Software Ltd. make OLE and Java objects and applets work in a distributed environment without requiring developers to write code. A 4th product, also in beta testing, will make it possible to manage OLE applications with network management software. The Network and Manage Ease products are designed to make it easier to build distributed applications without having to learn and program specific communications infrastructures and object models, which is difficult and time-consuming. Visual Edge hopes to eliminate, or at least reduce, the custom coding requirements for distributed applications. The Network Ease modules will make it easier for non-C++ programmers, such as Visual Basic developers, to take advantage of Corba's object properties and services for the Internet and intranets.
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Visual Edge's object middleware integrates OLE and Java components without custom coding
Visual Edge Software Ltd. is preparing this month to ship a trio of software packages, now in beta testing, that make OLE and Java objects and applets work in a distributed environment without requiring developers to write code. A fourth product, also in beta testing, will make it possible to manage OLE applications with networkmanagement software.
The Network and Manage Ease products are designed to make it easier to build distributed applications without having to learn and program specific communications infrastructures and object models, which is difficult and time-consuming, says Mike Foody, president of Visual Edge in St. Laurent, Quebec.
Traditionally, very high skill levels are required to build and maintain distributed applications that span multitiered client-server and Internet environments. Application developers usually need to know multiple programming languages, communications middleware, database architectures, and object models. Those skills are in short supply, and custom code for those many environments is timeconsuming and inefficient.
Wider Community
"Complexity has been a barrier to widespread use of these technologies in the past," says John Rymer, a VP at Giga Information Group, an IT research firm in Cambridge, Mass. Distributed computing is very difficult, with a small talent pool compared with the Visual Basic programming pool, he adds. "So this product is meant to open up the benefits of distributed objects to that broader community."
Visual Edge hopes to eliminate, or at least reduce, the custom coding requirements for distributed applications.
The Network Ease modules will make it easier for non-C++ programmers, such as Visual Basic developers, to take advantage of Corba's object properties and services for the Internet and intranets, says Ann Thomas, a senior consultant with the Patricia Seybold Group in Boston. "One of the nasty things about Corba is you have to define your object interface with a unique IDL [interface definition language], which is very C++-like. That's not the easiest thing in the world for the VB programmer. Network Ease makes it easier for the nonprofessional programmer to build Internet programs to connect into a back-end Corba service."
The Network Ease line consists of Network Ease for OLE, Network Ease for Java, and Network Ease for Applets. Network Ease for OLE can generate a 100% Java copy of any OLE/COM server code, such as an application written in Microsoft Visual Basic or Visual C++. The Java applet can then be downloaded by any Web browser and executed on the client computer; it can also access server-side services through Corba's Internet Inter-ORB Protocol (IIOP). All that's needed in between is an IIOP-compliant Corba object request broker.
Potential: Manage Ease's tree view lists OLE functions so developers can link an app to an SNMP service.
Network Ease for Applets is a plug-in for Netscape browsers and servers that lets all or part of a Java applet run on a server instead of sending it to the client. By doing this, application code can be distributed to the place for which it's best suited, and you avoid creating a processing bottleneck on one segment of the network.
The last product in the Network Ease line, Network Ease for Java, lets any Java class use a Corba ORB that supports IIOP without having to write any code, including IDL, which is used to interface between client applications and the Corba ORB.
Management For Windows Apps
The fourth product is Manage Ease for OLE, which lets OLE developers add application management to their Windows applications. It also lets administrators monitor application performance using existing management software. Manage Ease supports all of the low-level Simple Network Management Protocols, so the application can be supported by existing networkmanagement software.
In the past, building SNMP applications meant building the entire range of SNMP protocols into the application-a time-consuming effort that often led to application bloat. Developers add the Manage Ease ActiveX control to their application, build an OLE object that provides the properties and events they want the administrator to see, and add a line of code to pass the object into Manage Ease when the application starts. Manage Ease separates the SNMP portion and reduces development time.
Underlying these products is Visual Edge's Object Bridge technology, which provides bidirectional interoperability among various component software such as OLE, Corba, and Java, and other services such as application management, messaging and transactional middleware. Multiple programming languages are supported, too.
Building A Bridge
The company hopes that customers, using Object Bridge, will be able to build an enterprise integration architecture in which a desktop sees the enterprise as a collection of OLE objects, engineering sees it as Corba objects, and Web developers see it as local Java objects-all with a common naming service. Administrators will be able to configure the entire software structure from a logical perspective as a single entity. Developers will be able to work with the software system they're most comfortable with, using different types of components without having to modify existing source code.
Licensees of Object Bridge include Digital Equipment, HewlettPackard, IBM, Oracle, and Sun Microsystems.
Network Ease for Java, Network Ease for OLE, and Manage Ease for OLE are finishing their beta test cycles and will be generally available this month. The software will be sold over the company's Web site (www. visualedge. com). The Network Ease products will sell for $449 each, per server.
Visual Edge for Applets is currently in a limited beta and is scheduled to ship in August. The price for Manage Ease is $495 for a single user copy.
Copyright CMP Publications, Inc. Jun 9, 1997