Keeping you abreast of the ever-changing Java world
Index of news briefs
AIR Team puts Java to use for the stock market
Cafe 1.2 final available for Windows 95/NT
Connect Corp. offers Java-powered products
Globetrotter trots out the FLEXlm license manager for Java
Learning Tree offers Java certification courses
Liquid Reality VRML kit entirely in Java
SNiFF+ 2.2 ships with Java support
Speech recognition technology incorporates Java
Visix counts on Eleven for Java-based applications
Hello? Java’s on the phone
National Semiconductor has jumped on the Java phone bandwagon. The company recently announced its purchase of a JavaOS license for use in telephonic devices. The announcement follows a recent one by Nortel, which has been readying its touch-screen telephones to run Java applications. Other companies with similar plans include Nokia, maker of mobile telephones. Additionally, Lucent Technologies, a spinoff of AT&T’s Bell Labs, has developed specifications with Sun Microsystems to enable integration of the Internet and telephony using Java.
National’s product, dubbed iPhone, will allow telephone-based Internet access. Initial release is planned for early 1997, though, according to the company, Java capability will be added at a later date. Java’s tasks for the iPhone have yet to be determined. –Max Airborne
https://www.nsc.com, https://www.nortel.com, https://www.nokia.com
Also see information about the Nortel announcement at: http://www.javaworld.com/javaworld/jw-06-1996/jw-06-newsbriefs2.html# Nortel.
AIR Team puts Java to use for the stock market
Sun Microsystems and AIR Team Inc. announced the industry’s first Java-based graphical interface and application suite tailored to financial advisors. The product, demonstrated last week at the Securities Industry Association (SIA) show in New York, lets financial services advisors retrieve real-time stock market information, review a client’s financial portfolio, generate reports and graphs, then transmit both the data and live applications to the customer over the Internet. AIR Team also has incorporated an interactive whiteboard application to allow the advisor and customer to view and interact with the information at the same time. –M.A.
Learning Tree offers Java certification courses
Learning Tree International has announced the addition of a Java Professional Certification Program to its lineup of vendor-independent professional certification programs. The multicourse Java program aims to provide programmers with the skills needed to create Java applets and standalone applications. According to the Reston, VA-based company, certified graduates of the program are able to incorporate their Java code into Web sites and client/server applications.
“Since Java first appeared a little more than a year ago, it has become one of the hottest technologies for cross-platform application development,” said Dr. Alan B. Salisbury, Learning Tree’s president. “Also, Java’s support for text, graphics, sound, and motion is quickly transforming the World Wide Web into an interactive medium. Learning Tree’s Java and Web site development courses are already among our most popular, and our customers are telling us they want more.” –M.A.
Speech recognition technology incorporates Java
The Speech Recognition API Committee announced Java support for SRAPI Version 2.0. The SRAPI specification is cross-platform, creating a standard method for applications to interact with speech technology providers. The API supports continuous command technology, phrase recognition technology, discrete and continuous dictation technology, and speech synthesis. Application developers can write to the SRAPI specification and take advantage of SRAPI-compliant speech engines from a variety of vendors.
The SRAPI Committee is currently chaired by Novell. Core members include Dragon Systems, IBM, Intel, Kurzweil AI, Lernout & Hauspie, and Philips. Other contributors to the SRAPI effort include Voice Pilot Technologies, Kolvox, Interactive Products, Centigram, Berkeley Speech Technologies, Voice Processing Corp., Speech Technology Laboratories (a division of Panasonic), and other companies in the speech industry. –M.A.
Globetrotter trots out the FLEXlm license manager for Java
Aimed at the electronic software distribution market, Globetrotter introduced FLEXlm for Java, a license management tool for software developers.
“FLEXlm provides a means for software vendors to control product evaluations and deliver purchased licenses without resorting to commercially unsound shareware business strategies,” said Richard Mirabella, Globetrotter’s vice president. “FLEXlm allows Java-based products to more quickly achieve a business critical mass, by minimizing unpaid use of software and making marketing and sales more efficient. This is of great value to software businesses going into the Java marketplace.”
Pricing for a FLEXlm developer license starts at ,000. The production version of FLEXlm for Java will be available in August. –M.A.
Cafe 1.2 final available for Windows 95/NT
Symantec released the final version for Cafe 1.2 for Windows 95/NT. Current Symantec Cafe customers can download it via ftp from windev.symantec.com (/pub/updates/cafe/1.2/final) by logging in using the personal user ID and password provided with their original Cafe purchase. Version 1.2 incorporates the JDK 1.0.2, allows local debugging without TCP/IP, and supports array browsing. The debugger supports exception handling and remote debugging, and it has a just-in-time compiler. –M.A.
SunLabs develops Java Wallet
In an effort to make spending money on the Internet easier, Sun Microsystems Laboratories (SunLabs) is developing a “Java Wallet.” The Java Wallet software will keep track of a user’s accounts and financial information, including credit cards, checking accounts, electronic cash, receipts, coupons, and electronic ID. Small transactions, like fees charged for visiting a Web page, would be seamless. For larger transactions, the user would be prompted for confirmation of the purchase. For further information, visit SunLabs’ Web page. –M.A.
https://www.sunlabs.com/research/javaWallet.html.
Connect Corp. offers Java-powered products
Connect Corp. announced software designed to reduce the start-up time of Java applets and increase their performance by automatically downloading applets only when needed. Connect Quick, which also implements persistent classes and compresses Java class files and images before transfer, is secure, utilizing proprietary encryption and compression routines. Any applet accelerated with Connect Quick must obey the Java security manager.
Connect Corp., a provider of Web-based customer management applications based in Scottsdale, AZ, also offers other Java products: Connect Widgets, Connect Forum, and Connect Issues.
Widgets is a commercial-quality library of user interface components for the Java environment. Widgets extends the Java JDK, adding components and implementing them across all platforms. Designed from the ground up for Java and written entirely in Java, these components offer seamless integration with any Java applet.
Forum, a “CompuServe-style” online forum for the Web, is a Java-based application with an intuitive interface; it uses open, industry-standard technology, is secure, and can be integrated with other applications from Connect.
Connect Issues is an issue management system designed to track specific issues on the Web; a software company, for example, could configure issues to be product defects, enhancement requests, and documentation defects. –J.S.
SNiFF+ 2.2 ships with Java support
TakeFive Software announced it has begun shipping SNiFF+ 2.2, a suite of Unix development tools that helps developers manage complex C, C++, and Java applications. SNiFF+ 2.2 has an open architecture, and gives developers the flexibility to integrate their choice of editors, compilers, debuggers, and source code managers with a consistent GUI. SNiFF+ 2.2 supports multiple-language development. The browsers and menus now dynamically support C, C++, Java, IDL, and Fortran. Several new tools have been added since the previous version, including a documentation editor that generates and maintains source code documentation in HTML format. Shipping now, SNiFF+ 2.2 costs ,990; evaluation copies can be downloaded via FTP from the TakeFive Software Web site. –M.A.
Liquid Reality VRML kit entirely in Java
Dimension X released a beta version of its Liquid Reality developers kit. According to the company, Liquid Reality is not only the first platform-independent implementation of VRML 2.0, but also the only VRML 2.0 toolkit coded entirely in Java. This toolkit grounds the platform upon which developers will create and deliver the next generation of 3-D Internet content. Liquid Reality with VRML 2.0 support is available on the Windows 95, Windows NT, Solaris and Linux platforms with Macintosh and Pippin versions to follow.
The kit includes support for 3-D sound; compatibility with multi-user servers; an open API; 250 classes to support 3-D content creation; Java classes upon which developers can build a branded VRML 2.0 browser; access to ICE, a low-level, high-speed 3-D graphics engine that lets developers alter core rendering routines, which allows for extension or enhancement of the game/world; and the ability to create VRML 2.0 applets, which, unlike other VRML plug-ins & browsers, would not have to be installed on the client’s desktop. The beta version of Liquid Reality can be downloaded from the Dimension X Web site. –M.A.
Visix counts on Eleven for Java-based applications
Visix announced Eleven, a software environment that generates fully compliant Java-based applications and supports their execution across multiple platforms. Eleven consists of two integrated components: a visual Java-specific integrated development environment (IDE) and an intranet application platform (IAP) for production application deployment.
This new distributed object architecture is consistent with that developed by Visix over the last several years. Eleven is ideal for those developing products, or adapting existing products, for use in high-performance, feature-rich deployment configurations based on the Internet and intranets. Available in July, Eleven will run on Microsoft Windows 95 and NT, Mac/OS, and Unix platforms. –J.S.
Java security weakness fixed
Sun Microsystems Inc. subsidiary JavaSoft has fixed the security bug in Java that was discovered last week by David Hopwood, an English postgraduate student in computer science at Oxford University.
Hopwood was able to read and write to local files on a Java client by loading Java applets from two servers and accessing and disabling the Java Virtual Machine (JVM) security manager — the mechanism that prevents applets from reading and writing to a user’s hard drive. According to JavaSoft, the bug allowed Hopwood to manipulate the way objects are assigned and the way they collaborate in order to undermine the Java type system.
JavaSoft officials report that the company has fixed the bug and is taking a number of steps to increase security. “We are now funding two teams of security experts to find flaws with the source code,” said Mary Ann Mueller, a staff engineer at JavaSoft.
The company has contracted Blackwatch, a company of former US National Security Agency experts, and a team of Princeton University researchers to find security loopholes within Java.
“Our plan it to impose Orangebook, or military-grade, security on Java,” said Mueller. “But you have got to understand that Java is a cross-platform programming language for the Internet, so what we are trying to do is pretty damn hard.”
The bug discovered by Hopwood is the latest in a series of Java security bugs discovered this year, and JavaSoft has created a Web page as an attempt to provide up-to-date information on several of them:
https://www.javasoft.com/java.sun.com/sfaq/index.html.
For further information about this most recent bug and others, see David Hopwood’s Web page:
http://ferret.lmh.ox.ac. uk/~david/java/bugs/.
–Niall McKay, IDG News Service
