• BEA WebLogic Integration Grows 140 Percent, Adds More Than 160 Customers
• BEA unveils plans to take on EAI vendors; launches Liquid Data
• Chutney Apptimizer Review
• A useful Gartner quote to use
• General Motors adopts Web services
• Hurwitz Group Closing Sept. 30, 2002 - Debt pulled the noted small consulting firm down.
• IBM RUBS SOAP INTO MQ
• Mercator 6.7 adds support for JCA, JMS, among 38 enhancements
  • Mercator Supports Interoperability between SWIFT ISO 15022 FIN and XML Syntax Messages
• Novell (formerly Silverstream) Extend 4 released
• Ovum: Don't hold your breath waiting for the IT market to rebound
• SOFTWARE SECTOR HAS 'REACHED MATURITY'
• Sonic moving back to UK
• DISTRIBUTED SERVICE-ORIENTED ARCHITECTURES: DELIVERING STANDARDS-BASED INTEGRATION
  • SonicXQ review
• JMS Work Brings Asynchronous Features to Apache SOAP
• SpiritSoft Draws Bead on TIBCO
• SpiritSoft achieves place in Sunday Times Tech Track 100
• SUN OFFERS FIRST LOOK AT J2EE 1.4
• Sun to Offer Factory-Integrated FIX Software
• SWIFT makes Web services push
• TheServerSide goes live on heterogeneous WebLogic/Oracle9iAS cluster - with help from Tangosol's Coherence cache
• Tomcat is the leading Java App Server; Oracle rising and JBoss at respectable 14%
• Users taking over business rules management
• webMethods and SWIFT Partner to Modernize Payment Processes Between Financial Institutions and Corporate Customers
• Versant transfers to NASDAQ small-cap

BEA WebLogic Integration Grows 140 Percent, Adds More Than 160 Customers

Customer Adoption Driven by Order Management and Single View of the Customer. SAN JOSE, Calif., Oct. 7 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- BEA Systems, Inc. the world's leading application infrastructure software company, today announced that more than 160 new BEA WebLogic Integration(TM) customers were won in the first two fiscal quarters of 2003, bringing its installed base to 290 customers. BEA WebLogic Integration revenue grew 140 percent in the latest quarter, Q2'03, compared to the same period last year. Growth was primarily driven by customers' needs to automate and streamline order management, and to develop a single view of their customers on a unified, standards-based platform. More than 35 percent of the 290 BEA WebLogic Integration customers have already deployed their integration projects. More than 50 percent of these projects focus on automating order management, be it quote-to-cash applications for manufacturers, service provisioning for communications companies, or straight-through processing projects for financial services companies. http://biz.yahoo.com/prnews/021007/sfm048_1.html At this rate BEA's integration base will soon catch up with the EAI leaders like webMethods, Tibco and SeeBeyond - and that's not including those who do their own integration based simply on J2EE app servers and components...

BEA unveils plans to take on EAI vendors; launches Liquid Data

See http://www.crn.com/sections/BreakingNews/breakingnews.asp?ArticleID=37702

Chutney Apptimizer Review

Find the review at http://www.infoworld.com/articles/se/xml/02/09/16/020916seappt.xml. Apptimizer is a competitor to SpiritCache (though more a plug-in than a development framework).

A useful Gartner quote to use

"Loosely coupled asynchronous message based processing is fundamental to the enterprise application infrastructure" - Yefim Natis, Research Note, 24 Jan 02, Gartner

General Motors adopts Web services

See internetnews.com story at http://www.internetnews.com/ent-news/article.php/1474591

Hurwitz Group Closing Sept. 30, 2002 - Debt pulled the noted small consulting firm down.

By Sandra Swanson/Information Week

The roster of technology research and consulting firms shrank again Monday, as Hurwitz Group apparently closed its doors. The boutique firm's analysts--totaling about 10--were told Monday that it would be their last day with the firm, says Pete Lindstrom, former Hurwitz security analyst. A skeleton crew remains, he says. The company's Web site, Hurwitz.com, was inaccessible Monday. No one from the firm other than Lindstrom could be reached. Overwhelming debt finally took its toll on the company, he says. "It's an unfortunate situation. We had good products and services, but we couldn't rebuild after the debt load overtook us."

Lindstrom plans to work independently as a security analyst and says he'll work to fulfill remaining Hurwitz client obligations.

There goes Tyler McDaniels - one of our best friends in the analyst community and noted evangelist for SpiritCache...

IBM RUBS SOAP INTO MQ

In an effort to make Web services messaging more reliable, IBM plans to inject support for SOAP into its WebSphere MQ messaging platform. Big Blue will release a beta version of WebSphere MQ with Web services support in the fourth quarter.

http://www.infoworld.com/articles/hn/xml/02/09/30/020930hnmqseries.xml

Note mention of SpiritSoft alongside Sonic - relating to Gartner consultant Roy Schulte's view on our position with SpiritWave Integration Server

= IONA TO HELP HP WITH WEB SERVICES=

HP and Iona Technologies are huddling a little closer together thanks to a deal that will see HP run Iona's Orbix E2A Web Services Integration Platform -- XMLBus Edition on HP-UX. Iona, in return, will become one of HP's preferred partners in the area of Web services integration between J2EE and .NET. http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,3959,569762,00.asp How does this square with the HP/BEA alliance? I think we should be told...

Mercator 6.7 adds support for JCA, JMS, among 38 enhancements

Mercator Expands Its Leadership in Enterprise Application Integration Software with Introduction of Mercator 6.7 with New Solutions-Oriented Architecture; New Release Helps Large, Global Companies Proactively Manage and Increase Visibility into Their Vital Business Systems and Operations, Reducing Costs and Enhancing ROI. Tuesday October 8, 9:43 am ET. [...] The new release provides thirty-eight (38) new enhancements and features that empower customers for B2B expansion; provide extended support for Java and other key industry standards; enhance automated control of complex business processes; and extend the performance, scalability and manageability of customers' existing systems and applications - further strengthening Mercator Software's leadership position as a premier global provider of enterprise-wide integration solutions. Enhanced Java support: adds support for integration with Java Messaging Systems (JMS); Facilitates integration with Java-based directories; Enables third-party software to invoke Mercator deployment via JCA (Java 2 Enterprise Edition Connector Architecture). Support for standards like JCA makes it even easier to embed the Mercator integration solution inside major industry platform players such as BEA, Oracle, Microsoft and IBM. http://biz.yahoo.com/bw/021008/82302_1.html Mercator follows CrossWorlds to offer JCA connectivity for their proprietary platform, making it easier to coexist with J2EE - they also support COM and CORBA. They have also made it easier to work with XML, S/MIME and various B2B formats (eg RosettaNet).

Mercator Supports Interoperability between SWIFT ISO 15022 FIN and XML Syntax Messages

Novell (formerly Silverstream) Extend 4 released

Ovum: Don't hold your breath waiting for the IT market to rebound

'Recovery? Don't bet on it...'

Anybody hoping to see the long-awaited recovery of the IT sector may have to wait a couple more years, according to analyst house Ovum, which today [23 Sept] dashed hopes of a rebound in 2003. The company warned that decision makers in the IT sector may be basing current predictions for next year on over-optimistic forecasts - building false hopes of a recovery. Julian Hewett, chief analyst at Ovum, said: "Ever since the downturn began, it seems that the recovery has always been 'two quarters away'. It seems to us that the industry is still living in denial." Hewett said: "At Ovum, we are revising our estimates for the European software market in 2003. We now expect that market growth will decline about four per cent in 2002 and be flat at best in 2003." http://www.silicon.com/bin/bladerunner?30REQEVENT=&REQAUTH=21046&14001REQSUB=REQINT1=55669

SOFTWARE SECTOR HAS 'REACHED MATURITY'

Analyst advises vendors to change strategy accordingly. http://www.vnunet.co.uk/News/1135388

Sonic moving back to UK

We hear on the grapevine that a Sonic direct sales force will be re-established in the UK in the next month or two

DISTRIBUTED SERVICE-ORIENTED ARCHITECTURES: DELIVERING STANDARDS-BASED INTEGRATION

Sponsored by Sonic Software This paper discusses the advantages for building distributed service-oriented architectures and identifies the necessary components for the successful deployment and management of distributed processes, including Web services. The concept of an Enterprise Service Bus is introduced as a solution for common problems faced when configuring, deploying and managing a distributed service-oriented architecture. Click here: http://searchWebServices.com/r/0,,6226,00.htm?sonicsoftware

SonicXQ review

See http://www.infoworld.com/articles/ap/xml/02/09/30/020930apsonic.xml

JMS Work Brings Asynchronous Features to Apache SOAP

Vendor support for a variety of SOAP-to-Java (and Java-to-SOAP) communications techniques is gaining steam. In the latest example, the Apache Axis Project later this month will release the industry's first native SOAP support asynchronous web services. The support for asynchronous communications follows the inclusion of a JMS (Java Message Service) transport mechanism offered to Apache by Sonic Software. http://www.responsetrack.net/lnk/com100/?104SP0FBWEU See also item on theServerSide - which is down right now, so I can't reference it.

SpiritSoft Draws Bead on TIBCO

http://www.sdtimes.com/news/063/story10.htm#top SpiritSoft Ltd. is focusing on capturing customers from TIBCO Software Inc., by emphasizing the standards compliance of its SpiritWave Java messaging software, compared with the non-JMS architecture of TIBCO’s Rendezvous.

SpiritSoft achieves place in Sunday Times Tech Track 100

http://www.spiritsoft.com/news/pressreleases.asp?id=32 http://www.fasttrack100.co.uk/migration/dbIndex.asp?siteID=3&searchName=&yr=2002&sort=num&area1=99

SUN OFFERS FIRST LOOK AT J2EE 1.4

Sun Microsystems has sneak previewed the upcoming revision of its Java 2 Enterprise Edition (J2EE) server environment, version 1.4, which will be the first release to include full, baked-in support for Web services protocol. Sun says the reference implementation will be available for download in late October or early November with an official release in early 2003, but users and application server vendors alike are just beginning to use the last J2EE release, 1.3. http://www.internetwk.com/story/INW20020926S0006

Sun to Offer Factory-Integrated FIX Software

10/04/02, 8:30 a.m. EDT--Sun Microsystems has announced plans to broaden its Sun Customer Ready Systems (CRS) program and to ship entry-level servers preloaded with FIX software solutions. Sun expects that the factory integration program will help lower acquisition costs and decrease complexity for financial institutions that want to join the global FIX protocol network. The FIX protocol is designed to ease automation and straight-through processing for the global financial community, enabling standardized electronic communication between buy-side and sell-side institutions. The factory-integrated solution is expected to be available through the Sun CRS program early next year.

SWIFT makes Web services push

XML Web services plans have taken flight at the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunications (SWIFT), thanks to partnerships with vendors Iona and webMethods. Its goal is to allow its 7,000 financial institutions to link their payment processes using Web services. http://www.internetnews.com/ent-news/article.php/1472661

TheServerSide goes live on heterogeneous WebLogic/Oracle9iAS cluster - with help from Tangosol's Coherence cache

http://www2.theserverside.com/resources/article.jsp?l=tsscluster1 "Our database is the bottleneck, so how can we architect the site so that we only go the database when we REALLY need to? We decided to put a distributed cache layer in front of the database. We chatted with our good friend Cameron Purdy, of Tangosol, and decided to use their product, Tangosol Coherence. We installed the product on both of the servers, and could immediated share data between the two using the ReplicatedCache. The interface to Coherence is simple. You simply get a java.util.Map to get and set data into. Since we are using BMP Entity Beans, we tied the distributed cache into TSS very easily. In ejbLoad(), we looked in the cache first, and if the value object wasn't in there, we go to the database, update the cache, and the next time someone asks for a Thread, Message, User, Forum, or Category entity, it is just there. We strapped the cache into the other ejb*() methods in the appropriate way and tested. The more it was used, the more items were in the cache, and it was rare that the database was bothered.

Since TSS is heavy on the read side, we found that using caching at the JSP level as well as the entity level, is a perfect fit. We use the great open source project OSCache from OpenSymphony. It has allowed us to cache the different areas on the site. Why bother going back to the EJB layer at all to build the righthand bar, when we know it won't change for an hour? With simple tag libraries, we can configure the components of the site with different caching abilities. Thanks OpenSymphony."

NB - see how they used TWO different cache products to deal with EJB and JSP caching - you wouldn't need that with SpiritCache. Read the TSS discussion at http://www2.theserverside.com/home/thread.jsp?thread_id=15907&article_count=21 (ironically, I get "An Unknown error has occured, please try again later" error message - no connection I hope!).

Tomcat is the leading Java App Server; Oracle rising and JBoss at respectable 14%

The most commonly used Java application server execution environment today is Apache Software Foundation's Tomcat, according to BZ Research's latest Java Awareness Study, conducted in August 2002. The app-server question response clustered into four groupings, with Tomcat standing alone - 52.2 percent of all respondents said Tomcat was currently in use at their companies. Next were the three major commercial Java app servers: IBM's WebSphere, at 29.0 percent; BEA's WebLogic, at 24.5 percent; and Oracle's Oracle9iAS, at 20.8 percent. The third cluster comprised Macromedia's JRun, at 14.7 percent; JBoss.org's JBoss, at 13.9 percent; Sun's Sun ONE app server (iPlanet), at 11.8 percent; and Borland's AppServer or Enterprise Server, at 9.4 percent.

At the bottom of the list, all of which came in at 3.3 percent usage or lower, were Apple's WebObjects, Sybase's EAserver, HP/Bluestone's now discontinued App Server, Iona's Orbix, SilverStream's Extend and several others. http://www.sdtimes.com/news/063/story2.htm

See http://www2.theserverside.com/home/thread.jsp?thread_id=15802&article_count=66 for a techie war about whether Tomcat is really an app server. Note that this is a self-selected survey, and confined to the US, so can't be treated as gospel (but what can?). It suggests that Oracle is coming up fast (from 10% share of commercial market last year) and puts a decent figure on JBoss adoption.

Users taking over business rules management

Business rules are becoming dynamic, so dynamic that they are moving out of IT and over to the business side of corporations, contends Jim Sinur, vice president and research director at Gartner. Noting that businesses have seen the end of the stable world where organizations could write policies, procedures, guidelines and processes in stone, he said business rules now have to change quickly and IT has to change with them. Spending weeks or even months re-coding business processes does not compute in today's economy and it is costing companies money, he said during a Webcast on business rules sponsored by Pegasystems Inc., Cambridge, Mass. "There's a drag on rules agility and we're missing business opportunities," he said. "There's a significant amount of savings in the IT department if you can reduce the amount of effort involved with the rules, which would include even business users changing the rules." For the full story, visit http://www.adtmag.com/article.asp?id=6792

webMethods and SWIFT Partner to Modernize Payment Processes Between Financial Institutions and Corporate Customers

Joint Solution by webMethods and SWIFT Lets Financial Institutions Leverage Technical Investments to Advance STP with Corporate Customers BRUSSELS, Belgium, and FAIRFAX, Va., Sept. 30 /PRNewswire/ -- webMethods, Inc. , the leading provider of integration software, today announced that through a joint partnership with SWIFT, financial institutions will gain a proven, sustainable business method for automating payment processes with corporate customers. This partnership was forged to help today's financial institutions leverage their existing investments in online infrastructure to overcome barriers to automated payment processes with their corporate customers. http://biz.yahoo.com/prnews/020930/dcm012_1.html _webMethods is one of the many EAI vendors supporting SWIFT and its members in its move from EDI to XML/ISO 15022 - see also Mercator (through Braid, one of its past acquisitions), SeeBeyond, Tibco, Sybase (Financial Fusion), Heliograph, Sungard and Misys (source: http://www.swift.com/paso/index.cfm)_

Versant transfers to NASDAQ small-cap

http://biz.yahoo.com/prnews/020930/sfm111_1.html Versant follows Persistence to NASDAQ's small-cap market to avoid delisting, as its shares trade around 0.50c - 1/10th of its 52 week high, and capitalisation hovers under $6M (about the same as its loss in 12 months to July 2002, on sales of around $25M). Revenue in the quarter to July was about half that of the (nearly equivalent) period on the previous year.