Sun Microsystems lined up a range of partners to join it on stage for the official debut of Jini in San Francisco on Monday, with the emphasis distinctly away from traditional enterprise computer companies. True, Groupe Bull’s Bullsoft division, Computer Associates International Inc and Novell Inc were on the list. Bullsoft and CA both said they would add Jini support to their systems management products, while CA said its Jasmine database management system would also be integrated with Jini. Sun, however, appeared more interested in non-computer consumer devices such as the Bosch-Siemens dishwasher shown on stage at the event. Munich, Germany-based Bosch und Siemens Hausgerate GmbH says it is exploring the possibilities of using Jini in diagnostic applications, so that a home appliance would be capable of notifying a service agent of faults, perhaps before the users had noticed anything wrong. The network connection might be run through the existing home electricity lines. Industrial control networking company Echelon Corp said it would combine Jini with its own LonWorks network control systems. Peripheral vendors formed the largest group of supporters, with printer manufacturers such as Canon Corp and Epson Corp, thin-client and internet appliance companies such as Axis Communications Inc, Creative Design Solutions Inc and Encanto Networks Inc all down as licensees. Xerox Corp said it plans to use Jini to help it transform its range of copiers, printers and fax machines into portals for the internet. Kinko’s Corp was talking about offering remote printing services from the internet direct to its copy shops through Jini. And a prototype Kodak kiosk was demonstrated, sending pictures from digital cameras directly to printers. Sun CEO Scott McNealy said he wouldn’t be surprised to see Kodak add a button to its cameras that could automatically transmit pictures from the camera to the nearest photo developer bureau. Wireless PDA and handheld device companies including Sharp Corp, 3Com Corp and Symbian Ltd were also in evidence, while Motorola Inc revealed plans to combine Jini with Piano, its own networking software research and development project. Piano is designed to get suitably-enabled mobile devices to automatically detect each other’s presence, creating a temporary wireless network, or just-in-time intranet. Back towards the computer side of things, disk drive makers Seagate Technologies Inc and Quantum Corp were both talking about using Jini to remove the complexities of sharing storage resources on the network. Quantum promised to ship its first Jini-compatible product this year. Meanwhile BIOS expert Phoenix Technologies Inc promised a pre-boot management systems that disabled PCs or information appliances could be located and accessed for diagnostics and repair. For help with actually developing Jini software – something which can be learnt in two days by programmers already familiar with Java, according to Sun – tools vendors Inprise Corp and Metrowerks Inc said they would support Jini in their respective products.
