Visix Software Inc, the Java and C++ development tools company, today ships the database version of its Vibe Java tool. It’s had the basic version out since March, but this one, called Vibe Enterprise, adds native access to Oracle and Sybase databases as well as ODBC compliance. The company reckons it outscores tools like Symantec Corp’s Visual CafT Pro because of its graphical query tool that enable the construction of SQL queries by pointing and clicking. But more importantly Visix reckons it wins because of its database architecture. It uses a layer of database services to access the databases rather than doing directly, and these services run on virtually any platform. This, says the company, enables it to run more client platforms linked to heterogeneous server platforms. The services also run the queries asynchronously to avoid conflicts. Vibe product manager Skip Faulf says the company is looking at Informix support, but said the API is not quite as open as the other two and will rely on access through ODBC for now. Faulf reckons Vibe Enterprise beats off Haht Software Inc’s Hahtsite tool because that is meant for browser -based applications, whereas Vibe is for building standalone and networked full-blown client applications. Vibe DE is integrated into Vibe Enterprise, which will be available this week for Windows 95 and NT, Macintosh, OS/2. Solaris will come next week, as will Irix and HP-UX support. The company is planning a distributed version of Vibe called Vibe Net. That will include Visix’s own Corba-compliant Object Request Broker (ORB), which it says will be able to talk to all other ORBs. It is due in the fall/winter timeframe, says Faulf. Another version of the basic development environment will arrive at about the same time as Vibe Net, and it will include support for the Java Developer’s Kit (JDK) 1.1. Right now Vibe DE supports JDK 1.02. It will be renamed Vibe SE. As for matching Vibe up against Visix’s original Galaxy C/C++ development environment, there ‘s no contest in terms of speed, and Faulf says he wouldn’t recommend, say, a CAD/CAM company to use Java over C++: Galaxy blows it away, he said in terms of performance. Vibe Enterprise is $4,000 per developer seat, per platform. It enables developers to deploy an unlimited number of runtime environments and to an unlimited number of databases.
