Poet Software Corp has delivered a final beta of its implementation of the group’s Java API for its object database, despite the fact that the Object Database Management Group hasn’t actually ratified it yet (CI No 3,104). The San Mateo-based object database company says the SDK comes with Java bindings that will let developers write applications which transparently exchange C++ and Java objects stored in its Poet Universal Object Server. The Java binding creates a single, unified object-type system shared by the Java language and in this case the Poet object database. To all intents and purposes the binding is perceived as a single language for expressing both database and programming operations. The syntax used to create, delete, identify, reference, get/set field values and invoke methods on a persistent object is no different from that used for objects of shorter lifetimes, says the company, which enables a single expression to freely intermix references to persistent and transient objects. The Server already supports ActiveX controls and Visual Basic applications. Meantime Poet is working on a new tool that enables the newly hatched ODMG standard to support relational as well as object databases. The Poet SQL Object Factory, expected to birth in some form before the end of this year, transparently maps objects from the object oriented development model into relational databases. Until now, explains the company, Java developers have had to develop objects in Java, design a database to store them, and then write SQL code to store these objects in relational databases. Its SQL Object Factory tool is supposed to put the kibosh on the need to design the relational database and write SQL code. The final version of Poet’s ODMG Java binding, and its C++ and Visual Basic APIs, are available for download at http://www.poet.com. The POET Java/ODMG SDK ships in August for $500.
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