Digital Equipment Corp today unveils another set of client-server products and services, in an event which sees it rearrange the way it markets its client-server products. The company has aligned its products into a series of frameworks addressing different areas of client-server computing. Now customers buying a product can choose from Production Integration, Data Integration, Management Integration, Network integration and Enterprise Objects, in a simplification of client-server strategies. DEC also announced a number of significant products, including version 2.5 of its Objectbroker object request broking system. The system now includes a set of Common Object Request Broker Architecture-compliant application programmable interfaces to take over from the older, proprietary interfaces buried inside version 2.1. The system is designed to be more compliant with the CORBA standard, for more transparent operation. DEC has also built in a preliminary gateway to Microsoft Corp’s Object Linking & Embedding 2.0 as promised in its Common Object Model announcement in November, but will cement this with a complete link in version 3.0; this version will also support a joint wire call based on object extensions to Microsoft’s Distributed Computing Environment Remote Procedure Call. DEC also launched its Cohesionworx object-oriented developer’s environment, which provides transparency between different operating environments to gain access to development tools. The system, which was promised last September (CI No 2,246), is designed to enable object developers to access a range of different development tools, across different Unix systems. Also announced was a deal with Forte Software Inc, for DEC to distribute the Forte application development environment, which enables users to develop applications in segments to run different hardware and software environments. DEC also rolled out a version of IBM Corp’s CICS transaction processing monitor to run under the OSF/1 Unix operating system.
