The Informix Inc DataBlade module program is well under way now, leading up to the release of the Universal Server at the end of the year. Universal Server is the object-relational combination of Illustra Technologies Inc’s content management system and Informix’s Dynamic Scalable Architecture relational database. The modules enable various multimedia data types to be stored as real objects in existing databases, rather than just parcels of data with object wrappers. Consequently, a great many companies were flashing their DataBlades about at Informix’s user event in Chicago last week. Informix itself announced plans to build an Adobe Systems Inc Portable Document Format DataBlade module so files created using Adobe Acrobat can be distributed across intranets. But there is no price or time-frame. Canadian Unix utilities and implementation company Mortice Kern Systems Inc, Waterloo, Ontario is creating a version control DataBlade for use with the Informix Universal Server out of its Web-based Integrity Engine change management software. The Data-Blade will be available from Mortice Kern this quarter priced from $500 per concurrent user – presumably for use with the Illustra Server as part of Informix’s DataBlade Developers Program until Universal Server ships. Mortice Kern’s version control technology is already bundled by Netscape Communications Corp with each copy of Netscape Enterprise Server for Web software developers. Open Text Corp will incorporate its Livelink library for document management application into a DataBlade module for release some time in the autumn, when pricing will also be determined. Cambridge, Massachusetts-based Open Market Inc will integrate its OM-SecureLink technology with Informix’s Internet Commerce DataBlade module. Used in conjunction with Open Market’s OM-Transact, its Internet commerce software, the IC DataBlade module with added OM-Secure-Link will enable businesses to conduct secure commerce over the Web based on inform ation residing in their Informix databases. Next up is MapInfo Corp, which will use its Map-Marker address-matching geocoding technology to create a Data-Blade module that enables address and spatial information to be stored on Universal Server. The module will incorporate all address and location components from separate data columns into a single data type, for easier storage and retrieval; no prices or dates are available yet. Other DataBladers include EcoLogic Corp, Excalibur Technologies Corp, Macromedia Inc, Mathsoft Inc, Premenos Corp, SRA Corp, Synopsys Inc, Verity Inc and VXtreme Inc. 24 companies have so far signed up to develop modules.
