COMMON Anaheim marked the beginning of COMMON conferences and expos taking place once a year instead of twice a year. As COMMON hoped, this change was reflected in increased attendance, more show-floor traffic, and according to many vendors, better leads as those shopping for solutions seemed to be asking more in-depth questions.

Perhaps it's fitting that in keeping with the idea of fewer conferences hopefully leading to a higher-quality experience for everyone, the vendors seemed to follow that theme by making fewer new product announcements than is usual for past COMMONs at the show, but generally they were announcements of more significance.

Application developers were the big winners this time as the bulk of news about new solutions and upgrades was aimed at them. Leading the pack was Business Computer Design International announcing WebSmart PHP, a web application-development tool that uses Zend Corporation’s PHP language on the System i, and ADVANCED BusinessLink’s Strategi SOA, a System i-native service-oriented architecture framework for developing applications.

WebSmart PHP runs on top of Zend Core and supports Core’s functionality as well as providing some specific features to support PHP development on the System i. These include more than 50 intelligent templates for accessing databases, text-based, and Visual HTML design tools, PHP coding tools, a built-in FTP client that enables connection to multiple servers, the ability to separate content presentation from program behavior, and a central repository for business, database, and presentation rules. The database templates guide developers through the necessary steps to perform specific functions and include support for DB2 SQL, MySQL, and record-level database access methods.

The Visual HTML design tool offers support for Cascading Style Sheets, incorporates wizards and code snippets for HTML components, and lets developers add HTML design elements and intermingle PHP and HTML presentation code via drag-and-drop actions. PHP coding tools include prompts, source color-coding, prototypes and associated tips for using PHP functions, context-sensitive help with appropriate links to Zend's PHP website, and embedded documentation for more than 5,000 PHP functions.

Strategi SOA, covered in NEWS Daily last week because ABL preannounced it before COMMON, is a development tool for building SOA architectures on the System i. To briefly recap, Strategi SOA lets developers manage application components independently, use any standard-language development environment for front- and back-end development work, and change legacy applications from within by breaking them up into SOA components.

Profound Logic Software unveiled Genie, an on-the-fly webfacing tool for System i apps. Running on V5R2 or higher, Genie is itself a browser-based tool that generates graphical versions of application screens from RPG-, CL-, Cobol-, and i5/OS-based programs. Although Genie can convert screens without programming, it also lets developers customize converted screens, pick and choose screens for conversion or convert all screens from an application, and choose between client-side Java scripts or a server-side automation language that navigates through applications. In addition to its conversion capabilities, Genie also includes a mode that lets users run a 5250 emulation session with optional password protection via a browser.

RJS Software Systems announced the impending release (by early June) of iPDF, an Adobe Portable Document Format (PDF) document-generation API for RPG. The API lets RPG developers update or replace existing report- and eForms-generation apps with the capability of creating Adobe Acrobat documents directly from RPG applications. iPDF supports writing text, bar codes, lines, boxes, circles, images, and other graphic elements in PDF documents as well as generating up to 40-column PDF documents with color coding that can be sent to mobile recipients such as Blackberries or devices running Windows CE. The API requires V5R2 or higher to operate.

Several existing development tools also received upgrades at COMMON:

Software tool developer mrc has enhanced m-Power, its Java-based application development tool for the System i, with SQL customization capabilities that let developers use database data in more useful ways. For example, the new changes enable the calling of SQL objects for any program, facilitate unions between data records, perform nested subselections of data, and create SQL-based queries over live files. The upgrade also helps programmers create SQL code from scratch more simply via m-Power’s external object capabilities.

Aldon announced Aldon Lifecycle Manager plug-in support for IBM’s recently released WebSphere Development Studio client (WDSc) 7.0. The modification extends Aldon’s change-control and other application life-cycle tools to applications built with WDSc 7.0 under i5/OS, Linux, Windows, and other operating systems.

Australia-based looksoftware rolled out version 8.1 of its application modernization suite, which includes newlook, centric, and soarchitect. What’s new is support for Microsoft Outlook and Google Gadgets that lets developers incorporate objects and capabilities from those two products within applications being converted from green-screen to graphical modes. For example, it lets developers produce a 5250 application with a GUI that’s tied to Outlook for workflow and messaging and that enables direct linking of Outlook folders to System i apps. In addition, looksoftware says soarchitect’s transaction-recorder feature coupled with Google Gadgets can provide portal applications superior to those possible using WebSphere Portal and SharePoint.

On the application-software side of new-product announcements are two new reporting tools unveiled at COMMON by their respective vendors but not available until late May:

NewGeneration Software introduced Qport Office, a reporting tool for MS Office users who want secure access to DB2 databases on the System i. Qport Office eliminates many time-consuming manual steps necessary when users try to move DB2 data to Office applications such as Word or Excel. For example, users can run queries directly from Windows desktop icons, design and update Excel workbooks and worksheets, create Word docs and Access tables from query output, and produce query output files, convert them to XLS, and send them to someone else. Qport Office also enables chaining between multiple files and queries, so users can initiate execution of an entire series of queries with one mouse click.

RJS Software also unveiled iForms, an electronic-forms and report-writing application. iForms lets users generate e-forms from data sources as varied as text-based spooled file reports, DB2 database files, SQL Server, MySQL, Oracle, and virtually any kind of database including those on other platforms. Users can build new forms or modify existing ones with a graphical design tool and store form and report templates on the System i for use with batch or interactive jobs. iForms doesn’t require an external PC to use and needs V5R2 or higher to operate.

Rounding out the product announcements at COMMON are two upgrades to existing applications software offerings:

iMessaging Systems hopped on the System i Voice-Over-Internet-Protocol (VOIP) bandwagon with an upgrade of its iNspire Call Center Suite that adds Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) capabilities. SIP is a VOIP-related signaling protocol for Internet telephony and related functions such as conferencing and instant messaging. The modification lets programmers integrate any System i application with telephony for such purposes as interactive voice response, intelligent call routing, custom screen displays, and automated and agent-assisted dialing services. It also means iNspire can integrate with VOIP environments as well as Time Division Multiplexing interfaces such as analog and T1 systems.

Finally, Quadrant Software improved Formtastic, its e-form, bar-code label, and MICR check-printing application with the ability to enable electronic funds transfers directly from System i via the Automated Clearing House (ACH) network’s Electronic Payments Module. Formtastic 5.4 supports this capability via a new plug-in that can take spooled data, convert the information to an electronic check, make sure the check meets compliance standards, and send it as an ACH file. This change lets Formtastic help enterprises make faster payments to employees, stockholders, and other businesses directly from System i screens. Other features added to Formtastic with the upgrade include support for United Parcel Service’s Maxicode 2D bar codes and check merge support for overflow spooled files.