Smalltalk, developed in the 1970s, may have been the original object-oriented language, but the clear winner among languages now available will be C++, according to a new report published by London’s Ovum Ltd this month. Providing an evolutionary path for the large number of existing C programmers, C++ is already emerging in major development projects, and is currently being used for internal projects by companies such as Sun Microsystems, Apollo Computer, Microsoft Corp and Apple Computer, as well as by its originator, AT&T Co Bell Laboratoires. The report – Object-oriented Systems: the Commercial Benefits by Judith Jeffcoate, Keith Hales and Valerie Downes, tracks the use of C++ in seven organisations, and claims that productivity gains achieved include a reduction in the amount of code needed by a factor of five. The current market for object-oriented products is split mainly between hybrid toolkits used for developing artificial intelligence systems (52% of revenues in 1988), and pure programming tools such as compilers and programming environments (44%). New market opportunities include class libraries, application generators for system developers, and end user tools. In the early 1990s, predicts the report, existing database suppliers and computer-aided software engineering tool vendors will move into the market with object-oriented versions of their products, swelling overall revenues from $140m in 1988 to over $2,000m by 1995. The report costs UKP550 or $995 and Ovum is on London 255 2670.
