Sandra Kurtzig recently flew to the UK to outline her strategy for Ask following the acquisition of Ingres. She is clear that following the merger the company is neither an applications company nor a database company, it is a serious software company dedicated to the promotion of client-server computing in the business world. One can hardly quarrel with the view that this is a sensible paradigm to adopt for selling software in the 1990s but what does it actually mean, and does Ask have the credibility to cut it as a serious software house? Ask is defining client-server computing as follows: the ability to split applications and databases across multiple processors or multiple computers. All well and good but Ingres is some way from delivering anything more complicated than a means to insulate application developers from system level engineering via Visual Object Templates when writing applications for client-server computing. A little more of which later. The core product driving this new strategy is Ingres version 6.3, a substantially re-engineered database to embrace modern features such as Windows 4GL, Knowledge Manager and Object Manager. This version is well-respected within the software industry, although to be fair while it outshines several well-known commercial databases with its implementation of some object-oriented technology and some expert system technology, it is not leading edge – in the commercial marketplace Sybase and Interbase are not being outpaced by Ingres Object Manager and Knowledge Manager. Where Ingres is scoring points is with Windows 4GL and here, of course, the company has been knocked back by the departure of six key members of the development team. Ms Kurtzig denies that this has had any impact whatsoever, she added that three further Windows 4GL products had nearly completed development when the band of developers left. Indeed, a Windows 3.0 version of the product is already in beta test and Open Look and Apple Mac versions will follow. Aside from a strong database offering and a whizzy application development tool that Ingres had before it joined Ask, what else is Ask offering for client-server computing? Well, the company says it will launch products it describes as Visual Object Templates to be used in conjunction with Windows 4GL, which will be marketed complete with an object-oriented data dictionary. Windows 4GL product marketing manager Matthew di Maria compared the Templates with the Ingres Vision product insofar as you can compare a character-based 4GL tool with a forms-based 4GL tool. The Templates, combined with other Ingres products look likely to take Ask Ingres into a fully-blown object-oriented lower CASE object-oriented environment.
Advance next generation of ManMan
Matt di Maria disliked the term CASE to describe the templates because they do not prescribe the analysis and design side of software engineering, although the templates are generic and when bought to market will work with a variety of CASE methodologies. Ingres has also followed Informix and joined the Object Management Group – spot that Hewlett-Packard connection and so presumably the Object Request Broker will be its favoured method of distributing applications in a client-server environment. And then there are the applications themselves Ask’s forte in the manufacturing sector. Here, Ms Kurtzig mentioned the Advance product, as yet unlaunched, which is the next generation of its ManMan manufacturing product. Under the Advance name, a General Ledger will be released, followed by Order Entry, Accounts Receivable, Inventory and Payables – these are generic applications that will be offered, along with Ingres, Windows 4GL, and the Templates, to third parties for customisation in sectors other than manufacturing. Only then will manufacturing-specific applications come out under the Advance brand name. In sum, Ms Kurtzig did a good job at squashing rumours and gossip that Ingres would become a manufacturing-dedicated database – the Ingres Products Division is clearly driving Ask, manufacturing applications
is now only part of Ask Computer Systems’ business. Since the merger, the industry has also noticed that Ingres is scoring marketing successes in its promotion of Windows 4GL and of Object Manager – indeed rivals are grumbling about slick presentations, and for that the Ask Ingres marketing divisions must take a lot of credit, although having a less ebullient Oracle to contend with has undoubtedly helped. The technology is strong, the marketing is focused, the financing is in place, the arch rival is currently on its knees – the flip side? If Ask is serious about being the recognised software leader in the worldwide evolution to client-server computing it helps to offer a blueprint, an architecture, some details about how this is to be done… Katy Ring
