The Online REPORTER
WEEKLY DISPATCHES FROM THE INTERNET FRONT
August 12 - August 16 1996 Issue No 11
JAVA FOR MAC OS RELEASED - APIS BY YEAR END
As we were going to press Apple Computer was preparing to make a beta version of the Mac Java runtime available for download. By the end of the year, the company is promising that the Java virtual machine will be built into the Mac operating system, with a published set of APIs that will let developers Java-enable their applications. The final version should also include a just in time compiler. Though the company has previously licensed Natural Intelligence's Java work, the Mac OS runtime is Apple's own work, based on Sun's development kit.
In the meantime, the pre-release version will enable users to run Java applets either though a stand-alone applet viewer or one implemented as a Live Object (ne OpenDoc component). The latter implementation is compatible with CyberDog 1.1; Apple's component-based Internet front-end. The package also includes Sun's standard set of eight Java classes; the AWT etc.
www.devtools.apple.com/mrj/
MICROSOFT DELIVERS JAVA/ACTIVEX SIGNING - FOR WINDOWS ONLY
Microsoft and VeriSign have made good on their promise to deliver digital signatures for Java applets and ActiveX controls. The "Authenticode" technology is implemented in version 3 of Microsoft's Internet Explorer or Windows 95 and NT, however the company has not said when it will have support for Macintosh or Unix.
Previously, JavaSoft has expressed its admiration for Microsoft's authentication approach, and in April Microsoft sent its code-signing proposal to the Worldwide Web Consortium. However as we went to press it was unclear whether JavaSoft would wrap the Microsoft approach into the forthcoming Java APIs. Microsoft also announced a compression/signing technology for ActiveX and Java designed to speed downloading. Again, though the Cabinet File (CAB) technology can be used by Java developers, the resulting, compressed applets will initially only be unpackable by Internet Explorer.
Authenticode is designed to uniquely identify a software component's author and ensure that it has not been tampered with. Developers wanting to sign their code need to download the ActiveX software development kit from http://microsoft.com/ intdev/sdk/. They then have to apply for a software publisher digital certificate from VeriSign's Digital ID Center at http://digitalid.VeriSign.com/.
The advent of Authenticode and CAB will leave developers in something of a quandary; use them and the code is inaccessible by non-Microsoft browsers, eliminating the whole point of Java. On the other hand, the new facilities are undoubtedly useful. Many developers, such as FutureTense Inc; are likely to follow both routes. B.C. Krishna, FutureTense's VP of technology says his company is making its Java code available in number of packaging options.
In the HTML pages FutureTense generates, the Microsoft-encoded applets are first reference using the 'object' tag; then the regular applets are referenced via the 'applet' tag. Non-Microsoft browsers ignore 'object' and so
NETSCAPE AND MICROSOFT DUKE IT OUT OVER NT WORKSTATION
The question of how many TCP/IP connections you can legally make to Windows NT workstation does not sound like the stuff of newspaper headlines. Yet, the story refuses to die with coverage in New York Times, Wall Street Journal and Washington Post last week.
Netscape announced that it had received an intemperate letter from Microsoft's legal department over advertising purporting to show that NT with Netscape Web servers is cheaper than NT Server with Microsoft's IIS. By comparing the price of Netscape plus NT Workstation with Microsoft's bundle of IIS with NT Server.
"Netscape has already caused irreparable harm to Microsoft, and further
publication of the deceptive information will only compound the damage," wrote Robert Gomulkiewicz, a Microsoft senior attorney, in the July 30 letter to Netscape. The letter gives Netscape until August 15 to "cease and desist" but does not say what its "or else" is.
Gary Reback, Silicon Valley lawyer and Microsoft antagonist, representing Netscape, revealed the letter and wrote back saying Netscape had no plans to change its marketing materials, and accused Microsoft of first trying to cripple Windows NT Workstation with a barrier to prevent more than 10 concurrent dial-ins, and then using licensing restrictions to impose the same restrictions.
Microsoft told the Wall Journal the letter was mainly intended to start a dialogue with Netscape. It's certainly done that. Netscape has also sent a copy of Reback's letter to the Justice Department, which has yet to comment.
The reason for the restriction is of course that Windows NT Server 4.0 costs about $1,130, NT Workstation costs only $320. The best excuse Microsoft can come up with for the artificial restriction is that it doesn't want customers to surpass the product's technical capabilities, which could cause breakdowns that would hurt Microsoft's image.
Lotus Development Corp's attempts at licensing Netscape Navigator as the Web browser for a future release of Notes have collapsed, Reuter reported - but neither side would even confirm that the two had been in such talks. It was widely perceived that Lotus needed Netscape a whole lot more than Netscape needed Lotus. Lotus has added Internet features to Notes 4.0, and has just finished the beta version of Notes 4.5, an interim version of the upcoming Domino rewrite which will be based entirely on Internet standards. Domino will support any browser .
Europe Online SA has now been formally declared bankrupt after the company told the Luxembourg Court of Commerce it was insolvent. The move came after talks with potential new shareholders failed to reach an agreement. Liquidators have been appointed, but Deutsche Telekom AG said it remained interested in co-operation with the bankrupt - but talks were still at an exploratory stage.
SECURE, ROBUST WEB? YOU NEED DCE-SAYS OPEN GROUP
Last week Open Group Research Institute - the former Open Software Foundation Research Institute which until this Tuesday is being run by Dr Ira Goldstein - made its DCE Web technology generally available. Goldstein describes DCE Web as a "new value proposition," which uses DCE to secure protected access control of any internet protocol.
DCE Web intercepts any code and puts in into a 'hardwired' channel done in software. DCE Web provides secure access to documents and services running on Distributed Computing Environment (DCE) servers over the web. Specifically OSF has enabled DCE naming, security and access control mechanisms to be deployed over the web. An interface module allows browsers to interact with servers via DCE.
It will work with off-the-shelf browsers and won't require source code alterations. OSF claims existing web applications can be ported to DCE Web using a toolkit without changing existing protocols or interfaces. DCE Web components include the WanD (Web and DCE) web server which supports standard TCP/IP-based http plus OSF's own DCE Remote Procedure Call (RPC).
Other protocols, including telnet, ftp and SNMP have already been demonstrated using DCE Web. It can function as a standalone web server or as an add-on to existing web servers. A Secure Local proxy provides secure DCE web access from client browsers. The Security Domain Gateway integrates web protocols such as SSL with DCE Web. DCE Web's been in development for a relatively short time; after a year of US Defense funding and a year of industry money, companies such as Dascom Inc are already shipping product. Industry support came from AT&T GIS, CP Labs (now Dascom), DEC, Gradient, HP and the University of Michigan.
Meantime, Gradient Technologies Inc has already released its implementation of DCE-Web as WebCrusader. It's now integrating WebCrusader with Spider Technologies' NetDynamics Java development system. The work should be complete in October. Gradient's already got Siemens Nixdorf Informationssysteme AG distributing its entire DCE-based product line.
Gradient also offers PC-DCE and Mac-DCE allowing DCE applications to be accessed from Microsoft and Apple desktops.
JAVA FOR DCE
In addition to its JavaLite Java operating system which Goldstein describes as "a software version of a network computer" other projects the Research Institute has underway include Jade, effectively Java for DCE.
The idea is to allow DCE clients and severs to be written in Java and make existing DCE applications accessible from Java applications. Between the fourth quarter and the end of next year the Institute will modify the DCE ISL compiler to generate Java stub code and provide access to the DCE API through a set of Java classes modeled on Hewlett-Packard Co's OODCE. Indeed Jade is effectively the Java equivalent of OODCE, which might just as easily be called C++ for DCE. Deliverables will include a DCE IDL to Java mapping specification, an abstract Remote Procedure Call class specification; a DCE IDL to Java compiler; and a DCE runtime encapsulated as Java native methods.
TURBO JAVA TO GO BEYOND JUST IN TIME, SAYS OPEN GROUP
TurboJ is a project exploring the compilation of Java on the fly. The idea is to create code that's more efficient than can be achieved with just-in-time (JIT) compilers. TurboJ will compile groups and classes rather than individual methods. The Institute will also make its improved Java garbage collection mechanism to Java licencees. Other collaborative work includes a project sponsored by Oracle Corp to create document version control over DCE Web that also allows annotation. The Institute has 100 staff and recently signed two new deals with the European Commission.
SUN TO LINK CORBA AND JAVA WORLDS WITH REPOSITORY
It's not just Netscape and Visigenics who are trying to link CORBA and Java (OR issue 10). Sun Microsystems Inc's software shop believes users and developers will have to live with both Java and Corba models for some time. However until one goes away it's prepared to allow developers to move between the two worlds without impediment, reports sister publication Unigram.X
With that in mind SunSoft is developing an object-oriented repository and program design method it says will allow developers to generate Java and Object Management Group Interface Definition Language (IDL) stubs from a single program. Given its belief that there will always be more Java developers than Corba programmers, the default repository will be Java-based.
There's no timeframe for the work though it says it'll start making noises about the work in the fall. It's building the repository from pieces of technology culled from other projects, but says if there's stuff it can't do then it's prepared to buy additional work in. It says it'll continue to support the Corba tools and IDL compiler it offers for use with its Solaris-based NEO object environment as long as they are required, but expects Java developers won't actually want to learn Corba, just access it. SunSoft stresses the work isn't a universal CASE-type object repository. It believes Corba will retain its usefulness for back-end and decision support systems but says it simply isn't suitable for the types of real-time work which Java can do well. There will always be a trade-off using Corba because of its language binding and language neutrality issues. It says a uniform language binding for Java and Corba is needed as soon as possible. And it needs to be exact, not one that's just close.
TRANSARC CONNECTS MICROSOFT CLIENTS TO DCE SERVICES
Distributed Computing Environment (DCE) house Transarc Corp is offering another one of its thin clients to provide access to additional DCE services from Microsoft Corp desktops. DFS-Light is effectively a Windows NT gateway which allows LAN Manager to send requests to a Distributed File System (DFS) server and retrieve DFS files in their native format from PCs. A user completes a password routine to authenticate a request; the routine is cached for subsequent access requests.
Transarc recently began shipping a DCE and Encina client for Windows called DeLite. DFS-Light does not require DeLite. Transarc's plans for Java-enabled clients are still under wraps DFS-Light costs $150 per seat on Windows and NT this quarter.
l Meantime Transarc parent IBM Corp has put its DFS-Web extension for Web servers out to beta. DFS-Web links the DCE-based Distributed File System to the Net through a browser. DFS-Web will allow client browsers to access DFS without requiring changes in the client APIs. General availability is scheduled for the first quarter.
INSIGNIA PREPARES NTRIGUE FOR MAC AND UNIX - SILENT ON JAVA
Want to run Windows applications on a Macintosh or Unix box, over the Internet? Insignia Solutions plans to launch Unix and Macintosh versions of its NTrigue client software at the beginning of next month. The NTrigue server, running on any Intel NT-box, is based upon Citrix System's WinFrame multi-user NT system. The server executes the Win3.1, 95 or NT applications, passing the screen output across the network to the client. The client can act as a helper application for Web browsers.
Insignia is touting the product both at corporates who want to get their spreadsheets etc running cross-platform, but also as a way for Windows developers to offer demos of their wares over the Internet. To this end it has put together an NTrigue Web kit which includes tools and templates for creating Web sites with embedded Windows applications. The Net Clients start from $199, but beta versions can be test-driven for free on Insignia's Web page www.insignia.com. The company refused any comment last week on whether it is writing an NTrigue client in Java. It is an obvious step - giving Java NC's the formidable ability to run existing Windows applications.
NEC LOOKS TO DIBA'S SKINNY INTERNET TECHNOLOGY FOR V830
NEC Corp, has gone to Diba Inc for the OS for its Internet consumer appliances. NEC launched the V800 32-bit skinny RISC family in 1992, and is now up to the V830. It has licensed the single-function Application Foundation from Diba Inc, the Belmont, California company formed by Oracle Corp Network Computer refugee Farzad Dibachi.
NEC has committed to promote Diba's software as its preferred Internet access technology for information appliances built by third parties. and it says it will also build the chips and Diba environment into televisions, telephones, video cassette recorders and other appliances.
The Diba pitch is that the Network Computer concept is still too expensive, and that you should be able to put your toaster on the Internet - it actually has a version of its device design that it calls Diba Kitchen, designed to mount under a kitchen cabinet and give access to recipes and nutritional data. Diba also says it expects to license its software to four Japanese and Korean consumer electronics companies over the next eight weeks.
The Interactive Digital Electronic Appliances software is a 300Kb operating system written in C. Diba employs 45 people now and expects to be up to 100 by year-end; it is considering an IPO next year.
DAZEL CONNECTS ITS OUTPUT TO THE INTRANET
Dazel Corporation, the Texas company with a corner on the output management market, has announced 'MetaWeb', which lets its Output Server handle intranet-based publish-and-subscribe functionality.
It effectively turns any application such as Oracle, SAP or a mainframe legacy into a web publisher. It promises the right data will get to the right people and cautions that it's not e-mail. It provides for multiple interoperable output domains. Early release is in late October or early November, followed by a beta in January. The real thing should be available next April on Unix and on NT in June. It'll probably be priced as an add-on. The company, a darling with the Fortune 500 set, will also probably turn up with a lightweight Dazel that publishes just to the web. A five-year-old "start-up," Dazel, founded by ex-IBMer Bob Fabbio, who also started Tivoli Systems, now an IBM franchise, should do between $10 million and $12 million this year, more than double last year.
AMERICA ONLINE BUYS AT&T'S IMAGINATION NET
AT&T Corp is most at home with what is contemptuously dubbed POTS for Plain Old Telephone Service, and its preference is being carried over into the on-line services and Internet access arena. Starting about four years ago, the company assembled a large portfolio of high value added network services, but one by one, these have all been dismantled or sold, and very soon it will be left with nothing more than Plain Old Internet Access. Latest to go is the ImagiNation Network Inc, which is going to the lustiest surviving bastion of proprietary on-line services, America Online Inc, Vienna, Virginia. The ImagiNation Network enables games enthusiasts to play each other on-line.
AT&T acquired ImagiNation Network in 1994 for $40m, but admits it has been losing money on the busines, and America Online is thought to have paid less than $40m. ImagiNation, Burlingame, California will migrate its users to the America Online Games Channel as it discontinues support for its MS-DOS-based games service.
NETSCAPE PUTS ITS CODE UP UNDER NCR'S MP-RAS
Partner-hungry Netscape Communications Corp says its Web software is being implemented for NCR Corp's MP-RAS 3.0 Unix, as well as NCR Windows NT boxes. All Netscape's SuiteSpot, which comprises the Netscape LiveWire Pro development tool, Netscape Enterprise server, Mail Server, News Server, Catalog server and Proxy Server, will be available on NCR WorldMark scalable server family from the end of November, and Netscape FastTrack server entry-level Web server will be bundled with NCR S40 servers running Windows NT by the end of next month. Proxy Server, Commerce Server and Navigator have already been implemented for MP-RAS and are out now, with the rest of SuiteSpot being released at the end of November. The whole of SuiteSpot will also go up under Windows NT as part of the pact. NCR will also support Navigator 2.0, Navigator Gold and subsequent releases of the client software for Windows 3.X, Windows95, Windows NT and MP-RAS.
PRETTY GOOD PRIVACY LICENSES TECHNOLOGY TO FTP
Redwood Shores, California-based Pretty Good Privacy Inc has signed its first licensing deal for its encryption software, with FTP Software Inc. FTP plans to use the encryption software in its newly-launched suite of network applications, OnNet 32 v2.0. The software is embedded within the suite's Mail OnNet electronic mail application. A two-icon system enables users to access to a tool bar, designating options to encrypt or decrypt a message and make a digital signature. Mail messages can also be left on a server or computer in an encrypted format, to be decrypted and read at will. FTP Software's version of PGP will interoperate with current freeware implementations.
MICROSOFT TO PUBLISH ITS VB, JAVASCRIPTING ENGINES GRATIS
Microsoft Corp has announced plans to deliver binary and source reference implementations of the scripting engines for Visual Basic, Scripting Edition and JScript, the Microsoft implementation of JavaScript. Both will be licensed at no cost to interested parties, and can be implemented for any operating system or hardware system. The support for Visual Basic Script and the JavaScript language in Microsoft Internet Explorer version 3.0 should enable Internet developers create interactive Web sites using either scripting language.
Microsoft hopes to win support from other browser and application vendors. Both Visual Basic Script and JScript are integrated with Microsoft Internet Explorer 3.0 using the ActiveX Scripting interface. Developers can script Java Applets using the JavaScript language. The ActiveX Scripting interface enables developers to co-ordinate the interaction of a variety of software components on the Internet, including Java Applets and ActiveX Controls written in other languages, using any scripting language that supports this interface.
VRML 2.0 FINISHED - CONSORTIUM LAUNCHED
After remarkably speedy consultation and voting, the ad hoc VRML Architecture Group (VAG) formally released the second version of the Virtual Reality Markup Language (VRML) at Siggraph last week. Version 2 adds a number of features that should make the virtual worlds more realistic, in particular the ability to interact with the objects and support for scripted behaviours. As expected, the finished proposal is fundamentally based upon Silicon Graphics' Moving Worlds Proposal. Version 2 has been adopted by the ISO and the International Electrotechnical Commission as a committee draft (ISO/IEC CD 14772).
At the same time, the Architecture Group moved to reduce its own importance with the establishment of the VRML Consortium, a not-for profit group charged with fostering the standard's and the community's development. With VRML out of the labs and in the commercial world the VAG has decided that its work is virtually done. www.vrml.org
VIRTUAL SAN FRANCISCO GOES ONLINE - 3D YELLOW PAGES
It sounds cute, but will it make money? BigBook, the US online yellow pages company has constructed a VRML model of San Francisco which will let users find businesses by the buildings that they are in. Once a user has selected a section of the city to view in more detail, they can click on individual buildings to see all the businesses located in that building, organized by category.
Searches can also be carried out within a specific area to generate business listings. A street-level map is also generated with the search results. The company reckons that the system is more than just a gimmick, paralleling the way that people really go about looking for local businesses. At the moment, the general effect is more like a set of children's building blocks than a city, but the evolution toward VRML 2 should fix some of that.
BigBook 3D is aiming to be the first commercially supported VRML environment, and Netscape, Silicon Graphics and Informix are first onboard, with a blimp circling the city and a bi-plane pulling a text banner across the sky.
Rental of 3D billboards is also available, as is the ability to wrap photographs of their real store fronts around the corresponding virtual facade. BigBook is also hoping to turn the site into a virtual shopping mall affair, with stores setting up electronic commerce operations within their "buildings". To that end, it has started a developer program.
The company says it has a proprietary, automated process that transforms satellite imagery and aerial photography into dimensionally accurate 3D models, which are integrated with its database of 16 million businesses. It reckons that it can produce additional 3D cities "in a matter of weeks."
NETSCAPE AND AUTODESK TO SHARE 3D FILE STANDARDS
Netscape and Kinetix; Autodesk's multimedia arm, have cozied up still further with mutual pledged support for each others 3D file formats. At Siggraph Kinetix introduced its plug-in that lets its 3D Studio Max package output VRML 2.0. It says it will ensure the plug-in will also support Netscape's Live3D. Kinetix will also incorporate Live3D as a native object within its Hyperwire 2D and 3D Web title authoring tool. In return Netscape says it will incorporate support for two Kinetix and Autodesk file formats - 3DS and DXF - into Live3D.
The agreement is the latest stage of an understanding which has been going on since the begining of the year. Kinetix gets a massive audience for 3D models authored using its tools, Netscape gets influential support for Live3D and access to some nice 3D technology and expertise. Netscape says it will extend Live3D substantially, by incorporating support for the Kinetix file formats.
Kinetix is also a Netscape ONE licensee - it is taking Netscape's Java Internet foundation classes and has agreed to support Netscape LiveConnect for linking plug-ins, Java applets and JavaScript. There are no promises as to when the company will implement the stuff.
SILICON GRAPHICS OPENS APIS TO COSMO VRML BROWSER
Silicon Graphics Inc has announced the public availability of its Cosmo Player application programming interface. Cosmo Player, its VRML 2.0 browser and plug- in to Netscape Navigator, runs under Windows95, NT and on Silicon Graphics workstations.
By publishing the interface, it says its developers will be able to extend the functionality of the player, creating cross-system Java plug-ins to add multimedia capability like streaming media and real-time data feeds. Developer companies such as Black Sun Interactive and Worlds Inc supported the move. The interface is published at http://vrml.sgi.com.
l Microsoft Corp has optimised its Direct3D for Intel Corp's MMX multimedia extensions - the first generally available three-dimensional graphics interface to be optimised, says Microsoft. Intel launched the MMX extensions back in April.
San Francisco-based Black Sun Interactive; specialising in adding multi-user capabilities to VRML worlds has ported its 'CyberHub Client' plug-in to Silicon Graphic's Cosmo VRML 2.0 browser. CyberHub Client, formerly known as CyberLife already runs with Netscape Navigator's Live3D facility in Navigator. The plug-in adds multi-user interaction with 3D avatars and voice chat. The Cosmo version will available from Black Sun's site from September. The company also announced it has acquired Attic Graphics' 3D avatar technology. www.blacksun.com
Seybold Seminars is getting together with Silicon Graphics to run a week-long conference for World Wide Web authors, artists and developers from December 2 in San Francisco. It will include the "World Movers Developers Conference" centered on VRML 2.0 compliant tools and technologies.
Intervista Software Inc used Siggraph to start talking about its VRML 2.0 browser, WorldView 2.0 which it says will be available as a standalone application on Windows 95/NT and MacOS; and as plug-in Microsoft Internet Explorer and Netscape Navigator. Evaluation versions will be available for Windows in August and for Macintosh in September. It will support Java, JavaScript and Visual Basic Script.
Black Sun Interactive has also teamed up with online-community operator GeoCities, which has decided two dimensions aren't enough for its users. The company is taking Black Sun's CyberHub T1 server software to support the new project. The firms already have a financial link. Black Sun's majority backer is the Internet-specific @Ventures investment firm. @Ventures, a subsidiary of CMG Information Services Inc, is also a "significant" stockholder in GeoCities. www.geocities.com, www.blacksun.com
San Diego-based Template Graphics Software Inc has launched 3Space Assistant, 3D viewer/editor that allows Windows NT and Windows 95 users to
import, view, manipulate and edit 3D files on the desktop, using CAD, VRML and Open Inventor formats. The company also announced TGS Workshop, a suite of extensions to Silicon Graphics' Open Inventor 3D toolkit. One of Workshop's components, VRMLMaster, implements VRML 2.0 and will be bundled with Open Inventor for Win32 v2.2 from the end of the month. www.tgs.com.
VIRTUAL SNIPPETS
VOCALTEC UNPHASED BY INTEL'S FREE INTERNET PHONE
Despite reporting losses of $2.8m last week, Internet telephony pioneer VocalTec Ltd, Herzlyia, Israel is optimistic for its future, even in the face of competition from a similar product that Intel Corp gives away for free.
VocalTec chief executive Elon Ganor says most of its revenues won't even come from its consumer Internet phone product but from its Internet Phone Telephony Gateway, which it will begin selling this month. The Internet phone product costs about $50 and enables users to talk to each other over the Internet through microphones and speakers on their personal computers, avoiding long-distance charges. The gateway, costing $4,000, will enable companies to speak to each other over public lines on the Internet or private lines within intranets, so branch offices and other remote users can talk either over their personal computers or from personal computer-to-telephone.
VocalTec will add a Web conferencing server for use with the gateway, but hasn't released details. Meanwhile VocalTec is striking deals with firms to offer personal computer-to-phone access so that users that hit on those companies' Web sites can talk to them through their personal computers. As a result of those deals, when users with Netscape Communications Corp's Navigator or Microsoft Corp's Internet Explorer browser click on a symbol on a Web page, they will automatically download a free plug-in of VocalTec's Internet phone software and will be able to call a company, which can then speak to them on a traditional phone.
The plug-in is a lighter version of VocalTec's Internet phone software, which began shipping in May. Ganor said VocalTec's software was way ahead of what Intel is offering. "Ours has real-time directories rather than static and Intel's doesn't run on 80486s. They're just putting out a pretty product to push their processors," she said.
IDT OFFERS INTERNET TO ANY PHONE SOFTWARE SERVICE
IDT Corp, the former International Discount Telecommunications, claims to have the first Internet phone system that enables computer users to make calls to standard telephones via the Internet - and in response to the wave of product announcements from Internet phone rivals, it is releasing its full commercial version of Net2Phone three months ahead of its original plan.
The company's original business and still its mainstay is its 'callback', which enables people rto make their overseas calls to be made at US-level tariffs. Net2Phone lets people to place calls from anywhere in the world via the Internet to any ordinary telephone around the world, saving up to 95% off traditional international long distance rates.
Calls originating from any country in the world and terminating in the US will be billed at $0.10 a minute off-peak, $0.15 a minute at other times. Calls to international locations will cost $0.05 above IDT's cost for connecting the call, so that Net2Phone calls from the US to England would cost $0.18 a minute - 60% less than the average rates now charged by major US long distance carriers, the company says.
Net2Phone is based on proprietary, patent-pending software developed in-house by the company that enables personal computer users to place calls directly to standard telephone equipment on the receiving end of the call, taking advantage of the fact that IDT owns its own telecommunications switching equipment: Net2Phone software enables Internet users from anywhere in the world to dial into the IDT Web site and be connected to its telephone network.
SUN, LUCENT DELIVER JOINT JAVA TELEPHONY OBJECT SPEC
Sun Microsystems Inc and Lucent Technologies Inc have come up with a Java telephony object specification to enable developers to write Java applications to integrate speech and data connections.
It will be used, they say, to tap into existing computer-telephony integration systems and enable sharing of voice, data, electronic mail, facsimile and video. Lucent has already demonstrated an application that managed conference calls on a voice network from a computer, with the potential for sharing documents in a virtual conference room as well, according to the company.
The specification will enable integration of existing call control software standards, such as Novell Inc's TSAPI interface and Microsoft Corp's rival TAPI and the Solaris-based SunXTL.
SYBASE KILLS ITS NEW MEDIA OP AS VIDEO SERVERS SLUMP
Not yet a year old, Sybase Inc's New Media Division is up for the chop following a stern profits warning. Last month, Sybase reported a £20m pre-tax loss for the second quarter and laid off 10% of its total work force, making around 600 staff redundant.
Consequently, the Emeryville-based software company that once rivalled Oracle Corp has now decided that its voyage is too precarious to keep the baggage of its interactive television work, the New Media Division, and its Intermedia video server, desktop and set-top environments derived from its Gain Technology acquisition.
Last summer, video-on-demand was the talk of every town and to make that work, installations would need strong, reliable and scalable video server software. Sybase locked horns with Oracle over whose was the better and they both ran off to talk to the press about their glittering futures. So in August, Sybase announced plans to set up a New Media Division in Mountain View, California, outlining plans to provide Internet and interactive television tool and server software.
It also announced partners and developer colleges, which started in September with a series of interactive television developer seminars and workshops jointly sponsored by Hewlett-Packard Co, PowerTV Inc, Scientific-Atlanta Inc and Sybase. Running it on the HP MediaStream video server and Scientific-Atlanta Digital Home Communication Terminals, Sybase showed off its New Media Studio development environment and taught would-be video-on-demand vendors how to use the system. "Video-on-demand and interactive television were in vogue a couple of years ago," said Phil Robinson, UK marketing director for Sybase. "But as telcos decommit from those trials, we too are less committed to them."
BE INC GETS JAVA & INTERNET
Jean-Louis Gassee's Be Inc made a determined move into Internet territory last week with the announcement of the next version of its operating system.
Release 8 has several Internet tools embedded - all the usuals plus a Web server and browser. The company believes the BeBox will be much sought after for Internet applications. It also announced that it will embed Java into a future release and that it is working with Mertrowerks on that one.
Along with the release of BeOS DR8, the company has also introduced the BeBox Dual603-133 personal computer., with two PowerPC 155MHz 603e processors, as opposed to the earlier 66Mhz system. It comes with integrated CD-ROM drive, two MIDI ports, stereo and audio ports, three infrared control and two joystick ports, standard SCSI, parallel and high speed serial connectors, and a 37 pin GeekPort for "inventors and tinkerers". A fully configured BeBox Dual603-133 will cost $3,000 and should begin shipping at the end of next month.
In line with its promise to license BeOS for other hardware systems, the company showed the BeOS running on Power Computing Corp's Mac clones. The company is however stressing that BeOS for PowerMac is a technology demonstration, and not yet a shipping product. Developers already working with BeOS can get a free upgrade after September 2, and all new BeBox systems will ship with release 8 after that date. www.be.com
DOT Gossip
As the market for streaming audio hots up, Progressive Networks will launch a new version of its RealAudio player this week, C/Net reports. The new release isn't expected to introduce any new audio processing, but the user interface should be better with custom preset buttons for quick access to favourite Web sites and a scanning feature for jumping from sound clip to sound clip.
Philips and Magnavox last week set a $329 price tag on their WebTV box that lets you surf the Net on a television set.
Netscape Communications has announced its second Internet Developer Conferences will be held in New York from October 16 to 18. the company is aiming the event at enterprise developers building intranet applications and content. Softbank Expo is organizing things.
It made headlines around the world, and is being styled the "biggest blackout ever of an online service". America Online's nearly 19-hour blackout cut off its 6.2 million subscribers last week and caused nasty ripples as mail servers backed up around the world. Subscribers are getting one day's money back. The problems occurred when a routine maintenance break, expected to last 2 hours went wrong when the company tried to install high-speed switches from an unnamed vendor
Individual Inc has "terminated" the contract of its founder, president and CEO Joseph Amram, who has been on an indefinite leave of absence since July 24. Amram, who owns 13.2% of the personalised news-providers stock, had proposed a rapid series of investments which weren't to the board's taste since it viewed them as being outside of its core business. The company is looking for a new CEO and in the interim is being run by a triumvirate "office of the president".
Tandem is working on a new class of object-oriented transaction processing softwaredubbed TP Objects. The software, due out next summer is heavily web-based and will use a Java language concept, with Java ORBs talking to Corba ORB. The client-end will also be Java-based. Tandem's thrust these days is NT and TP Objects is supposed to ride on NT so there is likely to be some work under way to make an ActiveX version of the client software too.
Adobe has made a beta version of the 2.0 version of its PageMill 2.0 Web publishing tool available on its site. The release adds support for frames, client side image maps and improved tables and forms creation. It also allows HTML extensions, JavaScript and CGI scripts to be added into 'place holders'. The beta seems pretty stable and complete.
Privately held, Atlanta-based Penumbra Software Inc has begun shipping its 'Mojo' Java development environment. The Windows 95/NT package comprises a visual applet builder and a lower-level coder. A free trial version is available from www.penumbrasoftware.com.
We hear Sun is calling its thin-client JavaStation Mr Coffee. Reportedly it's due in October. It's been described as a stripped down SparcStation 5 with a PC keyboard.
Microsoft Corp is to bundle a copy of VeriFone Inc's virtual point-of-sale software with every copy of its new Internet retailing system, the Microsoft Merchant System, which has just gone into beta test and is designed to enable companies to set up virtual storefronts on the Internet: VeriFone's Internet commerce products, vPOS and vGATE, provide open Internet payment systems for financial institutions and merchants; Microsoft Merchant System is due to ship next quarter.
HP last week appointed long-serving Open Software Foundation technology chief Ira Goldstein - who joined the Foundation from HP to the newly-created positions of Internet technology and chief technology officer at its Computer Systems Organisation.
Excite Inc now has definitive agreement to acquire McKinley Group Inc, creator and owner of the Magellan On-Line Guide: Excite will pay 850,000 new shares - worth an indicated $5.95m, and will also assume about $10m in debt; Excite plans to retain the Magellan brand.
Cable & Wireless Plc, Vienna, Virginia says its Internet Exchange business unit has entered an agreement with Erol's Internet & Computers to develop a national backbone for Internet access in the US: initial market plans include Washington; Baltimore; Richmond and Norfolk, Virginia; Philadelphia; Pittsburgh; Chicago; Boston; Hartford, Connecticut; and New York.
Netscape is supposed to wheel out a version of its FastTrack server for Windows 95 this week.
Microsoft has agreed to license a portion of Dimension X's Liquid Reality technology for Internet Explorer. Liquid Reality Core, will be used to make Internet Explorer VRML 2.0 savvy and will be built into future releases of Windows 95 and NT operating systems. Microsoft had proposed its own 'ActiveVRML' work as a contender for the VRML 2.0 standard. The company is currently being ultra-coy about what it is doing with ActiveVRML, other than to say that development continues but that it won't compete with VRML proper.
Cupertino, California-based PointCast Inc has teamed with Infoseek Corp to enable users of its news-delivering screen saver to access additional information related to the news they track on PointCast: users will be able to move from a PointCast channel to a PointCast-Infoseek Web page of related stories, and the new service is free.
Aer Lingus is making a limited number of seats on its transatlantic flights from New York to Ireland available via the Internet to the highest bidder to become the first European airline to hold a seat auction on the Internet,. But you'd better make sure you know the cheapest standard fare on the route to avoid overbidding, which no doubt is what the airline is hoping that people will do. Unfortunately, the airline has also set a reserve price of $200 for a round-trip flight leaving New York in the last week of August.
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In what looks like an act of desperation following Intel Corp's decision to distribute its Internet telephony applet for free, Camelot Corp has announced that for new users of its rival DigiPhone Deluxe system, it will waive the new account start-up fee, and give them one month of free unlimited access.
The Microsoft/Yahoo experiment to let users type search terms into the URL slot has already been tried and seemingly discarded by Netscape. Readers with beta 4 or 5 of Navigator 3.0 can try typing a phrase into the slot. Navigator connects to cgi.netscape.com which picks a search engine at random and submits the query. Oddly, however, Netscape has removed the facility from beta 6 - no-one can tell us why.
WEEKLY DISPATCHES FROM THE INTERNET FRONT
August 12 - August 16 1996 Issue No 11
JAVA FOR MAC OS RELEASED - APIS BY YEAR END
As we were going to press Apple Computer was preparing to make a beta version of the Mac Java runtime available for download. By the end of the year, the company is promising that the Java virtual machine will be built into the Mac operating system, with a published set of APIs that will let developers Java-enable their applications. The final version should also include a just in time compiler. Though the company has previously licensed Natural Intelligence's Java work, the Mac OS runtime is Apple's own work, based on Sun's development kit.
In the meantime, the pre-release version will enable users to run Java applets either though a stand-alone applet viewer or one implemented as a Live Object (ne OpenDoc component). The latter implementation is compatible with CyberDog 1.1; Apple's component-based Internet front-end. The package also includes Sun's standard set of eight Java classes; the AWT etc.
www.devtools.apple.com/mrj/
MICROSOFT DELIVERS JAVA/ACTIVEX SIGNING - FOR WINDOWS ONLY
Microsoft and VeriSign have made good on their promise to deliver digital signatures for Java applets and ActiveX controls. The "Authenticode" technology is implemented in version 3 of Microsoft's Internet Explorer or Windows 95 and NT, however the company has not said when it will have support for Macintosh or Unix.
Previously, JavaSoft has expressed its admiration for Microsoft's authentication approach, and in April Microsoft sent its code-signing proposal to the Worldwide Web Consortium. However as we went to press it was unclear whether JavaSoft would wrap the Microsoft approach into the forthcoming Java APIs. Microsoft also announced a compression/signing technology for ActiveX and Java designed to speed downloading. Again, though the Cabinet File (CAB) technology can be used by Java developers, the resulting, compressed applets will initially only be unpackable by Internet Explorer.
Authenticode is designed to uniquely identify a software component's author and ensure that it has not been tampered with. Developers wanting to sign their code need to download the ActiveX software development kit from http://microsoft.com/ intdev/sdk/. They then have to apply for a software publisher digital certificate from VeriSign's Digital ID Center at http://digitalid.VeriSign.com/.
The advent of Authenticode and CAB will leave developers in something of a quandary; use them and the code is inaccessible by non-Microsoft browsers, eliminating the whole point of Java. On the other hand, the new facilities are undoubtedly useful. Many developers, such as FutureTense Inc; are likely to follow both routes. B.C. Krishna, FutureTense's VP of technology says his company is making its Java code available in number of packaging options.
In the HTML pages FutureTense generates, the Microsoft-encoded applets are first reference using the 'object' tag; then the regular applets are referenced via the 'applet' tag. Non-Microsoft browsers ignore 'object' and so
NETSCAPE AND MICROSOFT DUKE IT OUT OVER NT WORKSTATION
The question of how many TCP/IP connections you can legally make to Windows NT workstation does not sound like the stuff of newspaper headlines. Yet, the story refuses to die with coverage in New York Times, Wall Street Journal and Washington Post last week.
Netscape announced that it had received an intemperate letter from Microsoft's legal department over advertising purporting to show that NT with Netscape Web servers is cheaper than NT Server with Microsoft's IIS. By comparing the price of Netscape plus NT Workstation with Microsoft's bundle of IIS with NT Server.
"Netscape has already caused irreparable harm to Microsoft, and further
publication of the deceptive information will only compound the damage," wrote Robert Gomulkiewicz, a Microsoft senior attorney, in the July 30 letter to Netscape. The letter gives Netscape until August 15 to "cease and desist" but does not say what its "or else" is.
Gary Reback, Silicon Valley lawyer and Microsoft antagonist, representing Netscape, revealed the letter and wrote back saying Netscape had no plans to change its marketing materials, and accused Microsoft of first trying to cripple Windows NT Workstation with a barrier to prevent more than 10 concurrent dial-ins, and then using licensing restrictions to impose the same restrictions.
Microsoft told the Wall Journal the letter was mainly intended to start a dialogue with Netscape. It's certainly done that. Netscape has also sent a copy of Reback's letter to the Justice Department, which has yet to comment.
The reason for the restriction is of course that Windows NT Server 4.0 costs about $1,130, NT Workstation costs only $320. The best excuse Microsoft can come up with for the artificial restriction is that it doesn't want customers to surpass the product's technical capabilities, which could cause breakdowns that would hurt Microsoft's image.
Lotus Development Corp's attempts at licensing Netscape Navigator as the Web browser for a future release of Notes have collapsed, Reuter reported - but neither side would even confirm that the two had been in such talks. It was widely perceived that Lotus needed Netscape a whole lot more than Netscape needed Lotus. Lotus has added Internet features to Notes 4.0, and has just finished the beta version of Notes 4.5, an interim version of the upcoming Domino rewrite which will be based entirely on Internet standards. Domino will support any browser .
Europe Online SA has now been formally declared bankrupt after the company told the Luxembourg Court of Commerce it was insolvent. The move came after talks with potential new shareholders failed to reach an agreement. Liquidators have been appointed, but Deutsche Telekom AG said it remained interested in co-operation with the bankrupt - but talks were still at an exploratory stage.
SECURE, ROBUST WEB? YOU NEED DCE-SAYS OPEN GROUP
Last week Open Group Research Institute - the former Open Software Foundation Research Institute which until this Tuesday is being run by Dr Ira Goldstein - made its DCE Web technology generally available. Goldstein describes DCE Web as a "new value proposition," which uses DCE to secure protected access control of any internet protocol.
DCE Web intercepts any code and puts in into a 'hardwired' channel done in software. DCE Web provides secure access to documents and services running on Distributed Computing Environment (DCE) servers over the web. Specifically OSF has enabled DCE naming, security and access control mechanisms to be deployed over the web. An interface module allows browsers to interact with servers via DCE.
It will work with off-the-shelf browsers and won't require source code alterations. OSF claims existing web applications can be ported to DCE Web using a toolkit without changing existing protocols or interfaces. DCE Web components include the WanD (Web and DCE) web server which supports standard TCP/IP-based http plus OSF's own DCE Remote Procedure Call (RPC).
Other protocols, including telnet, ftp and SNMP have already been demonstrated using DCE Web. It can function as a standalone web server or as an add-on to existing web servers. A Secure Local proxy provides secure DCE web access from client browsers. The Security Domain Gateway integrates web protocols such as SSL with DCE Web. DCE Web's been in development for a relatively short time; after a year of US Defense funding and a year of industry money, companies such as Dascom Inc are already shipping product. Industry support came from AT&T GIS, CP Labs (now Dascom), DEC, Gradient, HP and the University of Michigan.
Meantime, Gradient Technologies Inc has already released its implementation of DCE-Web as WebCrusader. It's now integrating WebCrusader with Spider Technologies' NetDynamics Java development system. The work should be complete in October. Gradient's already got Siemens Nixdorf Informationssysteme AG distributing its entire DCE-based product line.
Gradient also offers PC-DCE and Mac-DCE allowing DCE applications to be accessed from Microsoft and Apple desktops.
JAVA FOR DCE
In addition to its JavaLite Java operating system which Goldstein describes as "a software version of a network computer" other projects the Research Institute has underway include Jade, effectively Java for DCE.
The idea is to allow DCE clients and severs to be written in Java and make existing DCE applications accessible from Java applications. Between the fourth quarter and the end of next year the Institute will modify the DCE ISL compiler to generate Java stub code and provide access to the DCE API through a set of Java classes modeled on Hewlett-Packard Co's OODCE. Indeed Jade is effectively the Java equivalent of OODCE, which might just as easily be called C++ for DCE. Deliverables will include a DCE IDL to Java mapping specification, an abstract Remote Procedure Call class specification; a DCE IDL to Java compiler; and a DCE runtime encapsulated as Java native methods.
TURBO JAVA TO GO BEYOND JUST IN TIME, SAYS OPEN GROUP
TurboJ is a project exploring the compilation of Java on the fly. The idea is to create code that's more efficient than can be achieved with just-in-time (JIT) compilers. TurboJ will compile groups and classes rather than individual methods. The Institute will also make its improved Java garbage collection mechanism to Java licencees. Other collaborative work includes a project sponsored by Oracle Corp to create document version control over DCE Web that also allows annotation. The Institute has 100 staff and recently signed two new deals with the European Commission.
SUN TO LINK CORBA AND JAVA WORLDS WITH REPOSITORY
It's not just Netscape and Visigenics who are trying to link CORBA and Java (OR issue 10). Sun Microsystems Inc's software shop believes users and developers will have to live with both Java and Corba models for some time. However until one goes away it's prepared to allow developers to move between the two worlds without impediment, reports sister publication Unigram.X
With that in mind SunSoft is developing an object-oriented repository and program design method it says will allow developers to generate Java and Object Management Group Interface Definition Language (IDL) stubs from a single program. Given its belief that there will always be more Java developers than Corba programmers, the default repository will be Java-based.
There's no timeframe for the work though it says it'll start making noises about the work in the fall. It's building the repository from pieces of technology culled from other projects, but says if there's stuff it can't do then it's prepared to buy additional work in. It says it'll continue to support the Corba tools and IDL compiler it offers for use with its Solaris-based NEO object environment as long as they are required, but expects Java developers won't actually want to learn Corba, just access it. SunSoft stresses the work isn't a universal CASE-type object repository. It believes Corba will retain its usefulness for back-end and decision support systems but says it simply isn't suitable for the types of real-time work which Java can do well. There will always be a trade-off using Corba because of its language binding and language neutrality issues. It says a uniform language binding for Java and Corba is needed as soon as possible. And it needs to be exact, not one that's just close.
TRANSARC CONNECTS MICROSOFT CLIENTS TO DCE SERVICES
Distributed Computing Environment (DCE) house Transarc Corp is offering another one of its thin clients to provide access to additional DCE services from Microsoft Corp desktops. DFS-Light is effectively a Windows NT gateway which allows LAN Manager to send requests to a Distributed File System (DFS) server and retrieve DFS files in their native format from PCs. A user completes a password routine to authenticate a request; the routine is cached for subsequent access requests.
Transarc recently began shipping a DCE and Encina client for Windows called DeLite. DFS-Light does not require DeLite. Transarc's plans for Java-enabled clients are still under wraps DFS-Light costs $150 per seat on Windows and NT this quarter.
l Meantime Transarc parent IBM Corp has put its DFS-Web extension for Web servers out to beta. DFS-Web links the DCE-based Distributed File System to the Net through a browser. DFS-Web will allow client browsers to access DFS without requiring changes in the client APIs. General availability is scheduled for the first quarter.
INSIGNIA PREPARES NTRIGUE FOR MAC AND UNIX - SILENT ON JAVA
Want to run Windows applications on a Macintosh or Unix box, over the Internet? Insignia Solutions plans to launch Unix and Macintosh versions of its NTrigue client software at the beginning of next month. The NTrigue server, running on any Intel NT-box, is based upon Citrix System's WinFrame multi-user NT system. The server executes the Win3.1, 95 or NT applications, passing the screen output across the network to the client. The client can act as a helper application for Web browsers.
Insignia is touting the product both at corporates who want to get their spreadsheets etc running cross-platform, but also as a way for Windows developers to offer demos of their wares over the Internet. To this end it has put together an NTrigue Web kit which includes tools and templates for creating Web sites with embedded Windows applications. The Net Clients start from $199, but beta versions can be test-driven for free on Insignia's Web page www.insignia.com. The company refused any comment last week on whether it is writing an NTrigue client in Java. It is an obvious step - giving Java NC's the formidable ability to run existing Windows applications.
NEC LOOKS TO DIBA'S SKINNY INTERNET TECHNOLOGY FOR V830
NEC Corp, has gone to Diba Inc for the OS for its Internet consumer appliances. NEC launched the V800 32-bit skinny RISC family in 1992, and is now up to the V830. It has licensed the single-function Application Foundation from Diba Inc, the Belmont, California company formed by Oracle Corp Network Computer refugee Farzad Dibachi.
NEC has committed to promote Diba's software as its preferred Internet access technology for information appliances built by third parties. and it says it will also build the chips and Diba environment into televisions, telephones, video cassette recorders and other appliances.
The Diba pitch is that the Network Computer concept is still too expensive, and that you should be able to put your toaster on the Internet - it actually has a version of its device design that it calls Diba Kitchen, designed to mount under a kitchen cabinet and give access to recipes and nutritional data. Diba also says it expects to license its software to four Japanese and Korean consumer electronics companies over the next eight weeks.
The Interactive Digital Electronic Appliances software is a 300Kb operating system written in C. Diba employs 45 people now and expects to be up to 100 by year-end; it is considering an IPO next year.
DAZEL CONNECTS ITS OUTPUT TO THE INTRANET
Dazel Corporation, the Texas company with a corner on the output management market, has announced 'MetaWeb', which lets its Output Server handle intranet-based publish-and-subscribe functionality.
It effectively turns any application such as Oracle, SAP or a mainframe legacy into a web publisher. It promises the right data will get to the right people and cautions that it's not e-mail. It provides for multiple interoperable output domains. Early release is in late October or early November, followed by a beta in January. The real thing should be available next April on Unix and on NT in June. It'll probably be priced as an add-on. The company, a darling with the Fortune 500 set, will also probably turn up with a lightweight Dazel that publishes just to the web. A five-year-old "start-up," Dazel, founded by ex-IBMer Bob Fabbio, who also started Tivoli Systems, now an IBM franchise, should do between $10 million and $12 million this year, more than double last year.
AMERICA ONLINE BUYS AT&T'S IMAGINATION NET
AT&T Corp is most at home with what is contemptuously dubbed POTS for Plain Old Telephone Service, and its preference is being carried over into the on-line services and Internet access arena. Starting about four years ago, the company assembled a large portfolio of high value added network services, but one by one, these have all been dismantled or sold, and very soon it will be left with nothing more than Plain Old Internet Access. Latest to go is the ImagiNation Network Inc, which is going to the lustiest surviving bastion of proprietary on-line services, America Online Inc, Vienna, Virginia. The ImagiNation Network enables games enthusiasts to play each other on-line.
AT&T acquired ImagiNation Network in 1994 for $40m, but admits it has been losing money on the busines, and America Online is thought to have paid less than $40m. ImagiNation, Burlingame, California will migrate its users to the America Online Games Channel as it discontinues support for its MS-DOS-based games service.
NETSCAPE PUTS ITS CODE UP UNDER NCR'S MP-RAS
Partner-hungry Netscape Communications Corp says its Web software is being implemented for NCR Corp's MP-RAS 3.0 Unix, as well as NCR Windows NT boxes. All Netscape's SuiteSpot, which comprises the Netscape LiveWire Pro development tool, Netscape Enterprise server, Mail Server, News Server, Catalog server and Proxy Server, will be available on NCR WorldMark scalable server family from the end of November, and Netscape FastTrack server entry-level Web server will be bundled with NCR S40 servers running Windows NT by the end of next month. Proxy Server, Commerce Server and Navigator have already been implemented for MP-RAS and are out now, with the rest of SuiteSpot being released at the end of November. The whole of SuiteSpot will also go up under Windows NT as part of the pact. NCR will also support Navigator 2.0, Navigator Gold and subsequent releases of the client software for Windows 3.X, Windows95, Windows NT and MP-RAS.
PRETTY GOOD PRIVACY LICENSES TECHNOLOGY TO FTP
Redwood Shores, California-based Pretty Good Privacy Inc has signed its first licensing deal for its encryption software, with FTP Software Inc. FTP plans to use the encryption software in its newly-launched suite of network applications, OnNet 32 v2.0. The software is embedded within the suite's Mail OnNet electronic mail application. A two-icon system enables users to access to a tool bar, designating options to encrypt or decrypt a message and make a digital signature. Mail messages can also be left on a server or computer in an encrypted format, to be decrypted and read at will. FTP Software's version of PGP will interoperate with current freeware implementations.
MICROSOFT TO PUBLISH ITS VB, JAVASCRIPTING ENGINES GRATIS
Microsoft Corp has announced plans to deliver binary and source reference implementations of the scripting engines for Visual Basic, Scripting Edition and JScript, the Microsoft implementation of JavaScript. Both will be licensed at no cost to interested parties, and can be implemented for any operating system or hardware system. The support for Visual Basic Script and the JavaScript language in Microsoft Internet Explorer version 3.0 should enable Internet developers create interactive Web sites using either scripting language.
Microsoft hopes to win support from other browser and application vendors. Both Visual Basic Script and JScript are integrated with Microsoft Internet Explorer 3.0 using the ActiveX Scripting interface. Developers can script Java Applets using the JavaScript language. The ActiveX Scripting interface enables developers to co-ordinate the interaction of a variety of software components on the Internet, including Java Applets and ActiveX Controls written in other languages, using any scripting language that supports this interface.
VRML 2.0 FINISHED - CONSORTIUM LAUNCHED
After remarkably speedy consultation and voting, the ad hoc VRML Architecture Group (VAG) formally released the second version of the Virtual Reality Markup Language (VRML) at Siggraph last week. Version 2 adds a number of features that should make the virtual worlds more realistic, in particular the ability to interact with the objects and support for scripted behaviours. As expected, the finished proposal is fundamentally based upon Silicon Graphics' Moving Worlds Proposal. Version 2 has been adopted by the ISO and the International Electrotechnical Commission as a committee draft (ISO/IEC CD 14772).
At the same time, the Architecture Group moved to reduce its own importance with the establishment of the VRML Consortium, a not-for profit group charged with fostering the standard's and the community's development. With VRML out of the labs and in the commercial world the VAG has decided that its work is virtually done. www.vrml.org
VIRTUAL SAN FRANCISCO GOES ONLINE - 3D YELLOW PAGES
It sounds cute, but will it make money? BigBook, the US online yellow pages company has constructed a VRML model of San Francisco which will let users find businesses by the buildings that they are in. Once a user has selected a section of the city to view in more detail, they can click on individual buildings to see all the businesses located in that building, organized by category.
Searches can also be carried out within a specific area to generate business listings. A street-level map is also generated with the search results. The company reckons that the system is more than just a gimmick, paralleling the way that people really go about looking for local businesses. At the moment, the general effect is more like a set of children's building blocks than a city, but the evolution toward VRML 2 should fix some of that.
BigBook 3D is aiming to be the first commercially supported VRML environment, and Netscape, Silicon Graphics and Informix are first onboard, with a blimp circling the city and a bi-plane pulling a text banner across the sky.
Rental of 3D billboards is also available, as is the ability to wrap photographs of their real store fronts around the corresponding virtual facade. BigBook is also hoping to turn the site into a virtual shopping mall affair, with stores setting up electronic commerce operations within their "buildings". To that end, it has started a developer program.
The company says it has a proprietary, automated process that transforms satellite imagery and aerial photography into dimensionally accurate 3D models, which are integrated with its database of 16 million businesses. It reckons that it can produce additional 3D cities "in a matter of weeks."
NETSCAPE AND AUTODESK TO SHARE 3D FILE STANDARDS
Netscape and Kinetix; Autodesk's multimedia arm, have cozied up still further with mutual pledged support for each others 3D file formats. At Siggraph Kinetix introduced its plug-in that lets its 3D Studio Max package output VRML 2.0. It says it will ensure the plug-in will also support Netscape's Live3D. Kinetix will also incorporate Live3D as a native object within its Hyperwire 2D and 3D Web title authoring tool. In return Netscape says it will incorporate support for two Kinetix and Autodesk file formats - 3DS and DXF - into Live3D.
The agreement is the latest stage of an understanding which has been going on since the begining of the year. Kinetix gets a massive audience for 3D models authored using its tools, Netscape gets influential support for Live3D and access to some nice 3D technology and expertise. Netscape says it will extend Live3D substantially, by incorporating support for the Kinetix file formats.
Kinetix is also a Netscape ONE licensee - it is taking Netscape's Java Internet foundation classes and has agreed to support Netscape LiveConnect for linking plug-ins, Java applets and JavaScript. There are no promises as to when the company will implement the stuff.
SILICON GRAPHICS OPENS APIS TO COSMO VRML BROWSER
Silicon Graphics Inc has announced the public availability of its Cosmo Player application programming interface. Cosmo Player, its VRML 2.0 browser and plug- in to Netscape Navigator, runs under Windows95, NT and on Silicon Graphics workstations.
By publishing the interface, it says its developers will be able to extend the functionality of the player, creating cross-system Java plug-ins to add multimedia capability like streaming media and real-time data feeds. Developer companies such as Black Sun Interactive and Worlds Inc supported the move. The interface is published at http://vrml.sgi.com.
l Microsoft Corp has optimised its Direct3D for Intel Corp's MMX multimedia extensions - the first generally available three-dimensional graphics interface to be optimised, says Microsoft. Intel launched the MMX extensions back in April.
San Francisco-based Black Sun Interactive; specialising in adding multi-user capabilities to VRML worlds has ported its 'CyberHub Client' plug-in to Silicon Graphic's Cosmo VRML 2.0 browser. CyberHub Client, formerly known as CyberLife already runs with Netscape Navigator's Live3D facility in Navigator. The plug-in adds multi-user interaction with 3D avatars and voice chat. The Cosmo version will available from Black Sun's site from September. The company also announced it has acquired Attic Graphics' 3D avatar technology. www.blacksun.com
Seybold Seminars is getting together with Silicon Graphics to run a week-long conference for World Wide Web authors, artists and developers from December 2 in San Francisco. It will include the "World Movers Developers Conference" centered on VRML 2.0 compliant tools and technologies.
Intervista Software Inc used Siggraph to start talking about its VRML 2.0 browser, WorldView 2.0 which it says will be available as a standalone application on Windows 95/NT and MacOS; and as plug-in Microsoft Internet Explorer and Netscape Navigator. Evaluation versions will be available for Windows in August and for Macintosh in September. It will support Java, JavaScript and Visual Basic Script.
Black Sun Interactive has also teamed up with online-community operator GeoCities, which has decided two dimensions aren't enough for its users. The company is taking Black Sun's CyberHub T1 server software to support the new project. The firms already have a financial link. Black Sun's majority backer is the Internet-specific @Ventures investment firm. @Ventures, a subsidiary of CMG Information Services Inc, is also a "significant" stockholder in GeoCities. www.geocities.com, www.blacksun.com
San Diego-based Template Graphics Software Inc has launched 3Space Assistant, 3D viewer/editor that allows Windows NT and Windows 95 users to
import, view, manipulate and edit 3D files on the desktop, using CAD, VRML and Open Inventor formats. The company also announced TGS Workshop, a suite of extensions to Silicon Graphics' Open Inventor 3D toolkit. One of Workshop's components, VRMLMaster, implements VRML 2.0 and will be bundled with Open Inventor for Win32 v2.2 from the end of the month. www.tgs.com.
VIRTUAL SNIPPETS
VOCALTEC UNPHASED BY INTEL'S FREE INTERNET PHONE
Despite reporting losses of $2.8m last week, Internet telephony pioneer VocalTec Ltd, Herzlyia, Israel is optimistic for its future, even in the face of competition from a similar product that Intel Corp gives away for free.
VocalTec chief executive Elon Ganor says most of its revenues won't even come from its consumer Internet phone product but from its Internet Phone Telephony Gateway, which it will begin selling this month. The Internet phone product costs about $50 and enables users to talk to each other over the Internet through microphones and speakers on their personal computers, avoiding long-distance charges. The gateway, costing $4,000, will enable companies to speak to each other over public lines on the Internet or private lines within intranets, so branch offices and other remote users can talk either over their personal computers or from personal computer-to-telephone.
VocalTec will add a Web conferencing server for use with the gateway, but hasn't released details. Meanwhile VocalTec is striking deals with firms to offer personal computer-to-phone access so that users that hit on those companies' Web sites can talk to them through their personal computers. As a result of those deals, when users with Netscape Communications Corp's Navigator or Microsoft Corp's Internet Explorer browser click on a symbol on a Web page, they will automatically download a free plug-in of VocalTec's Internet phone software and will be able to call a company, which can then speak to them on a traditional phone.
The plug-in is a lighter version of VocalTec's Internet phone software, which began shipping in May. Ganor said VocalTec's software was way ahead of what Intel is offering. "Ours has real-time directories rather than static and Intel's doesn't run on 80486s. They're just putting out a pretty product to push their processors," she said.
IDT OFFERS INTERNET TO ANY PHONE SOFTWARE SERVICE
IDT Corp, the former International Discount Telecommunications, claims to have the first Internet phone system that enables computer users to make calls to standard telephones via the Internet - and in response to the wave of product announcements from Internet phone rivals, it is releasing its full commercial version of Net2Phone three months ahead of its original plan.
The company's original business and still its mainstay is its 'callback', which enables people rto make their overseas calls to be made at US-level tariffs. Net2Phone lets people to place calls from anywhere in the world via the Internet to any ordinary telephone around the world, saving up to 95% off traditional international long distance rates.
Calls originating from any country in the world and terminating in the US will be billed at $0.10 a minute off-peak, $0.15 a minute at other times. Calls to international locations will cost $0.05 above IDT's cost for connecting the call, so that Net2Phone calls from the US to England would cost $0.18 a minute - 60% less than the average rates now charged by major US long distance carriers, the company says.
Net2Phone is based on proprietary, patent-pending software developed in-house by the company that enables personal computer users to place calls directly to standard telephone equipment on the receiving end of the call, taking advantage of the fact that IDT owns its own telecommunications switching equipment: Net2Phone software enables Internet users from anywhere in the world to dial into the IDT Web site and be connected to its telephone network.
SUN, LUCENT DELIVER JOINT JAVA TELEPHONY OBJECT SPEC
Sun Microsystems Inc and Lucent Technologies Inc have come up with a Java telephony object specification to enable developers to write Java applications to integrate speech and data connections.
It will be used, they say, to tap into existing computer-telephony integration systems and enable sharing of voice, data, electronic mail, facsimile and video. Lucent has already demonstrated an application that managed conference calls on a voice network from a computer, with the potential for sharing documents in a virtual conference room as well, according to the company.
The specification will enable integration of existing call control software standards, such as Novell Inc's TSAPI interface and Microsoft Corp's rival TAPI and the Solaris-based SunXTL.
SYBASE KILLS ITS NEW MEDIA OP AS VIDEO SERVERS SLUMP
Not yet a year old, Sybase Inc's New Media Division is up for the chop following a stern profits warning. Last month, Sybase reported a £20m pre-tax loss for the second quarter and laid off 10% of its total work force, making around 600 staff redundant.
Consequently, the Emeryville-based software company that once rivalled Oracle Corp has now decided that its voyage is too precarious to keep the baggage of its interactive television work, the New Media Division, and its Intermedia video server, desktop and set-top environments derived from its Gain Technology acquisition.
Last summer, video-on-demand was the talk of every town and to make that work, installations would need strong, reliable and scalable video server software. Sybase locked horns with Oracle over whose was the better and they both ran off to talk to the press about their glittering futures. So in August, Sybase announced plans to set up a New Media Division in Mountain View, California, outlining plans to provide Internet and interactive television tool and server software.
It also announced partners and developer colleges, which started in September with a series of interactive television developer seminars and workshops jointly sponsored by Hewlett-Packard Co, PowerTV Inc, Scientific-Atlanta Inc and Sybase. Running it on the HP MediaStream video server and Scientific-Atlanta Digital Home Communication Terminals, Sybase showed off its New Media Studio development environment and taught would-be video-on-demand vendors how to use the system. "Video-on-demand and interactive television were in vogue a couple of years ago," said Phil Robinson, UK marketing director for Sybase. "But as telcos decommit from those trials, we too are less committed to them."
BE INC GETS JAVA & INTERNET
Jean-Louis Gassee's Be Inc made a determined move into Internet territory last week with the announcement of the next version of its operating system.
Release 8 has several Internet tools embedded - all the usuals plus a Web server and browser. The company believes the BeBox will be much sought after for Internet applications. It also announced that it will embed Java into a future release and that it is working with Mertrowerks on that one.
Along with the release of BeOS DR8, the company has also introduced the BeBox Dual603-133 personal computer., with two PowerPC 155MHz 603e processors, as opposed to the earlier 66Mhz system. It comes with integrated CD-ROM drive, two MIDI ports, stereo and audio ports, three infrared control and two joystick ports, standard SCSI, parallel and high speed serial connectors, and a 37 pin GeekPort for "inventors and tinkerers". A fully configured BeBox Dual603-133 will cost $3,000 and should begin shipping at the end of next month.
In line with its promise to license BeOS for other hardware systems, the company showed the BeOS running on Power Computing Corp's Mac clones. The company is however stressing that BeOS for PowerMac is a technology demonstration, and not yet a shipping product. Developers already working with BeOS can get a free upgrade after September 2, and all new BeBox systems will ship with release 8 after that date. www.be.com
DOT Gossip
As the market for streaming audio hots up, Progressive Networks will launch a new version of its RealAudio player this week, C/Net reports. The new release isn't expected to introduce any new audio processing, but the user interface should be better with custom preset buttons for quick access to favourite Web sites and a scanning feature for jumping from sound clip to sound clip.
Philips and Magnavox last week set a $329 price tag on their WebTV box that lets you surf the Net on a television set.
Netscape Communications has announced its second Internet Developer Conferences will be held in New York from October 16 to 18. the company is aiming the event at enterprise developers building intranet applications and content. Softbank Expo is organizing things.
It made headlines around the world, and is being styled the "biggest blackout ever of an online service". America Online's nearly 19-hour blackout cut off its 6.2 million subscribers last week and caused nasty ripples as mail servers backed up around the world. Subscribers are getting one day's money back. The problems occurred when a routine maintenance break, expected to last 2 hours went wrong when the company tried to install high-speed switches from an unnamed vendor
Individual Inc has "terminated" the contract of its founder, president and CEO Joseph Amram, who has been on an indefinite leave of absence since July 24. Amram, who owns 13.2% of the personalised news-providers stock, had proposed a rapid series of investments which weren't to the board's taste since it viewed them as being outside of its core business. The company is looking for a new CEO and in the interim is being run by a triumvirate "office of the president".
Tandem is working on a new class of object-oriented transaction processing softwaredubbed TP Objects. The software, due out next summer is heavily web-based and will use a Java language concept, with Java ORBs talking to Corba ORB. The client-end will also be Java-based. Tandem's thrust these days is NT and TP Objects is supposed to ride on NT so there is likely to be some work under way to make an ActiveX version of the client software too.
Adobe has made a beta version of the 2.0 version of its PageMill 2.0 Web publishing tool available on its site. The release adds support for frames, client side image maps and improved tables and forms creation. It also allows HTML extensions, JavaScript and CGI scripts to be added into 'place holders'. The beta seems pretty stable and complete.
Privately held, Atlanta-based Penumbra Software Inc has begun shipping its 'Mojo' Java development environment. The Windows 95/NT package comprises a visual applet builder and a lower-level coder. A free trial version is available from www.penumbrasoftware.com.
We hear Sun is calling its thin-client JavaStation Mr Coffee. Reportedly it's due in October. It's been described as a stripped down SparcStation 5 with a PC keyboard.
Microsoft Corp is to bundle a copy of VeriFone Inc's virtual point-of-sale software with every copy of its new Internet retailing system, the Microsoft Merchant System, which has just gone into beta test and is designed to enable companies to set up virtual storefronts on the Internet: VeriFone's Internet commerce products, vPOS and vGATE, provide open Internet payment systems for financial institutions and merchants; Microsoft Merchant System is due to ship next quarter.
HP last week appointed long-serving Open Software Foundation technology chief Ira Goldstein - who joined the Foundation from HP to the newly-created positions of Internet technology and chief technology officer at its Computer Systems Organisation.
Excite Inc now has definitive agreement to acquire McKinley Group Inc, creator and owner of the Magellan On-Line Guide: Excite will pay 850,000 new shares - worth an indicated $5.95m, and will also assume about $10m in debt; Excite plans to retain the Magellan brand.
Cable & Wireless Plc, Vienna, Virginia says its Internet Exchange business unit has entered an agreement with Erol's Internet & Computers to develop a national backbone for Internet access in the US: initial market plans include Washington; Baltimore; Richmond and Norfolk, Virginia; Philadelphia; Pittsburgh; Chicago; Boston; Hartford, Connecticut; and New York.
Netscape is supposed to wheel out a version of its FastTrack server for Windows 95 this week.
Microsoft has agreed to license a portion of Dimension X's Liquid Reality technology for Internet Explorer. Liquid Reality Core, will be used to make Internet Explorer VRML 2.0 savvy and will be built into future releases of Windows 95 and NT operating systems. Microsoft had proposed its own 'ActiveVRML' work as a contender for the VRML 2.0 standard. The company is currently being ultra-coy about what it is doing with ActiveVRML, other than to say that development continues but that it won't compete with VRML proper.
Cupertino, California-based PointCast Inc has teamed with Infoseek Corp to enable users of its news-delivering screen saver to access additional information related to the news they track on PointCast: users will be able to move from a PointCast channel to a PointCast-Infoseek Web page of related stories, and the new service is free.
Aer Lingus is making a limited number of seats on its transatlantic flights from New York to Ireland available via the Internet to the highest bidder to become the first European airline to hold a seat auction on the Internet,. But you'd better make sure you know the cheapest standard fare on the route to avoid overbidding, which no doubt is what the airline is hoping that people will do. Unfortunately, the airline has also set a reserve price of $200 for a round-trip flight leaving New York in the last week of August.
(c) 1996 May not be copied
online REPORTER, a sister publication of Unigram.X and ClieNT Server News, is published weekly in Europe by:
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In what looks like an act of desperation following Intel Corp's decision to distribute its Internet telephony applet for free, Camelot Corp has announced that for new users of its rival DigiPhone Deluxe system, it will waive the new account start-up fee, and give them one month of free unlimited access.
The Microsoft/Yahoo experiment to let users type search terms into the URL slot has already been tried and seemingly discarded by Netscape. Readers with beta 4 or 5 of Navigator 3.0 can try typing a phrase into the slot. Navigator connects to cgi.netscape.com which picks a search engine at random and submits the query. Oddly, however, Netscape has removed the facility from beta 6 - no-one can tell us why.
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