Some news:
Java Plans Span Oracle Product Line
(02/22/98; 11:59 a.m. EST)
By Ellis Booker, InternetWeek
Oracle's portfolio of software products -- databases,
application server, development tools, and business
applications -- is being tied together with support for
distributed components and Sun Microsystems'Enterprise JavaBeans.
Officials gave InternetWeek the most comprehensive
blueprint to date of several products under development
that include the next release of its database
management system, Oracle 8.1, and its
next-generation application server, Application Server
5.0. But several steps must be taken in the interim,
including delivery of Application Server 4.0, due out in April.
Oracle officials also fleshed out a plan at company
headquarters in Redwood Shores, Calif., this week that
coordinates Oracle's application development tools with
a Java focus. These include the forthcoming
AppBuilder for Java 1.0, Designer/2000, and Developer/2000, Oracle's flagship application modelerand application builder.
The component approach of Oracle's products through
Java promises users a more flexible development and
deployment architecture. Just as significant, Oracle will
implement Java within its Oracle applications.
Nevertheless, Oracle has a big selling job ahead of it,
according to one user. "Oracle has a great database, but to be honest, even if they come out with this tomorrow, it will probably be
two years before we'd start to implement," said Tim
Meek, vice president of knowledge transfer at
Buckman Laboratories International. "Because they have an applications business, Oracle can take these concepts and show more than a
developer solution. They're in a position to offer a
business focus that goes beyond the "plumbing level"
discussions about Java and distributed components,"
said Merv Adrian, senior analyst at Giga Information Group.
The product road map will be officially divulged next month.
The first major Oracle platform enhancement, version
8.1 of the company's flagship database, will include
support for Java-based procedures, enabling the
database to be controlled with Java code, as well as its
own Java Virtual Machine that allows execution of
Java code on the database. The other, Oracle
Application Server 5.0, will feature support for
asynchronous messaging -- an important middleware
facility. Oracle Application Server 5.0 is expected in early '99.
"The main area we're focusing on is the use of the
same component model and repository," said Jeremy
Burton, vice president of tools product marketing at
Oracle.
Both are key to tying together Oracle's enterprise
resource planning, financial, human resources, and
manufacturing applications, a strategy that archrivals
SAP AG, PeopleSoft, and Baan are also pursuing.
Once Java components are supported on all three tiers,
Oracle applications will start to be componentized.
At the moment, Oracle applications can be accessed by
a variety of clients, including thin Java clients -- but the
server-side applications themselves remain wedded to
the Oracle database.
If successful, the new component-based approach will
let users and developers share components across the
Oracle application product line, as well as offer a
simpler, cleaner way for third-party developers to add
value to the Oracle applications suite, a $1.16 billion
business last year.
However, an ongoing challenge for Oracle will be to
promote this infrastructure to customers who do not
already use the Oracle database.
"Their ability to communicate any product other than a
database is almost zero," said Tim Sloane, director of
Internet Infrastructure Research at the Aberdeen
Group.
Even Oracle, when pressed, could not identify many
examples among the 2,200 customers using the Oracle
Application Server who do not also have a heavy
investment in Oracle's database.
"Historically, the sales have been part of the database
sale, and the product still definitely leverages the
database," said John Fomook, director of product
marketing for Oracle's Internet server products.
But Fomook said Oracle can make a go of the
Application Server independent of the database on one
side and its development tools on the other.
In fact, the application server can already reach
non-Oracle databases via Java Database Connection or
Open Database Connection standard interfaces.
Nevertheless, Aberdeen's Sloane praised Oracle's
efforts to better integrate its products.
Oracle's Burton noted that a number of the
architectural concepts now being brought forth were
originally contained in Sedona, the code name for
Oracle's object-based development tool. Sedona was
scuttled last fall because, in part, it lacked a strong Java
tie-in.
By the end of the year, Burton said, Oracle plans to
have what it calls internally "300% Java," referring to
the arrival of Java on Oracle client, middle-tier
application server, and database products.
The specifics for Oracle's tools, application server, and
database plans are as follows:
The commercial version of AppBuilder for Java 1.0,
Oracle's Java integrated development environment
(IDE), which is now in beta, is scheduled to ship in
April.
Also in April, AppBuilder will be able to create Java or
Common Object Request Broker Architecture
(CORBA) components for the Oracle Application
Server 4.0.
The CORBA and Java components will include "a few
lines of code" each to work with the Oracle Application
Server 4.0, but this limitation will go away when it
supports Enterprise JavaBeans.
"Whenever the Enterprise JavaBeans spec is finalized
[by Sun, owner of the spec], our Application Server will
support it," said Fomook.
At that point, any Java IDE that supports the creation
of Enterprise JavaBeans will work with the server,
Oracle said.
The architecture will provide a way for developers to
create JavaBeans for the client, Enterprise JavaBeans
for the application server, or the Oracle 8.1 database.
Oracle next plans to deliver large Enterprise JavaBeans
components -- analogous to IBM's San Francisco
framework -- which it will call Java Business
Components. They will function as application
frameworks.
These frameworks will then be available for
manipulation from within Developer/2000, letting
programmers using this tool create business logic
operating either on the client, middle-tier application
server or at the database. |
