Ontos Inc’s open storage management option for creating links between the latest R3.0 release of its Ontos/DB object database and non-object information sources, including relational databases, differs from other object vendors’ mechanisms for accessing the non-object world in that it is not a gateway, the Burlington, Massachusetts company claims. For starters, it does not generate code. The module, when implemented, provides applications programming interfaces that enable developers to write storage managers for other kinds of data types – including relational or hierarchical databases, video, CD-ROM or images – and the data appears as an object to application developers.
Silent wall
The module uses a dynamic distribution algorithm to bring data across, creating what Ontos says is a kind of silent wall between an application and the storage manager so that the structure of the data can be changed without altering the application. Shielding the application from the structure will allow, it says, for data to be imported and exported between objects and non-object data stores. The storage management option is the first to appear out of Ontos’ Object Cohesive Enterprise framework, revealed last year, an architecture it is using to develop products that will integrate object applications with conventional commercial systems. Ontos is planning further integration modules, and is expected to offer packaged storage managers for a range of commercial databases. Ontos admits it has been relatively quiet in the market compared with other object players, attributing its stance to a calculated policy of development and re-positioning of the product line and a considerable turning over of staff. In its view, the traditional object database market is increasingly divided into two very distinct product streams. First are those companies offering what it believes are effectively single-user, object-oriented programming environments, such as Object Design Inc’s Symbolics- and Lisp-based technology. The problem for Object Design and other language-oriented companies, says Ontos, is that it expects products from the likes of Borland International Inc to dominate this space over time. The second stream are products created by relational refugees that Ontos claims are little more than object-for-relational swap-outs. They are going to be squeezed by the mainstream relational firms which are extending their architectures into this space, the company claims. Ontos characterises its technology as distributed component object architecture and says its focus is on integration capabilities for large end-user deals like the Pacific Gas & Electric Inc win in the US, and British Telecommunications Plc in the UK. The US utility deal – which is actually a three-way object database-on-Windows NT tie-up between Pacific Gas, Ontos and Microsoft Corp – will, Ontos says, spawn other commercial products that it will offer over the next few months. Nevertheless, without the large OEM deals that a good number of its rivals have with some of the leading vendors – Ontos counts Cincom Systems Inc as its one large catch – it’s difficult to see how else the firm can position itself. Privately-held Ontos is now up to around 40 staff – the $5m-a-year company claims several hundred users and to have gone [into the] black, recently – with five employees at its Richmond, UK-based international unit. It attributes recent speculation about the closure of its UK operation to a probable disinformation campaign by disgruntled former distributors and employees. The unit is now run by managing director Andrew May. May, former UK marketing manager, succeeded Richard Williams with whom he established Ontos UK back in October 1992, after Williams left the firm after having failed to meet the parent company’s revenue and expense expectations. Ontos chief executive Jim Cannon says he is far happier with May at the helm and with the relationship he’s been able to build with continental partners. The Ontos products are distributed by French and German outlets and it is seeki
ng other European-wide arrangements.
