Powering fast and easy delivery of mobile device applications, Bluestone(R) Software, Inc. (Nasdaq: BLSW), a leader in business-to-Web and wireless technologies, today announced the general availability of its wireless application infrastructure--delivered as a set of mobile services to the company's award-winning, standards-based Total-e-Business(TM) platform. Bluestone will be debuting its wireless infrastructure at Internet World Fall 2000 Conference, running October 23-27 at the Jacob Javits Center in New York City, at booth # 1457.
Bluestone's wireless infrastructure, which includes Total-e-Server(TM) and Total-e-Mobile(TM) services, offers an elegant blend of power and ease-of-use in mobile access to existing enterprise applications. The new offering also establishes the reliable, scalable, and fault-tolerant infrastructure required for next-generation mobile commerce, wireless portals, and other applications geared specifically for mobile users of cell phones, pagers, PDAs, and thin-client devices. In addition, by providing access to industry standard mobile portals and gateways, like Nokia and Infinite Technologies, Bluestone makes it easier for its clients to address the needs of mobile commerce and computing.
"Organizations with little to no mobile expertise have huge expectations for their mobile applications," said John H. Capobianco, executive vice president of strategic planning for Bluestone Software. "Bluestone's wireless infrastructure can meet these expectations--first, by enabling an organization to support any thin-client device with one URL, or as we like to say `One URL Fits All,' and second, by ensuring the no-compromise performance, reliability and availability demanded by anytime, any device computing."
Specifically, Bluestone's wireless application infrastructure unites its Internet Operating Environment(TM), the world-class, standards-based foundation of Total-e-Business, with state-of-the-art mobile components and services. Highlights include Bluestone's Dynamic XSL Stylesheet Engine, which dynamically formats and parses content specifically for each client accessing mobile applications, as well as hybrid mobile and wired applications. As a result, organizations can reuse existing Web applications, supporting all mobile and wired users with a single application infrastructure. The bundled WAP technologies make Bluestone's Total-e-Business platform a one-stop source for mobile application development. The new wireless offering also includes a rich array of training tools and jump-start applications for developers who are just starting to work in the mobile arena.
In addition, Bluestone's wireless infrastructure brings proven high performance, fault tolerance, security, and scalability to the mobile environment. Based on Sun Microsystems' J2EE (Java 2 Platform, Enterprise Edition) specification and using XML as its internal communications vehicle, Bluestone's Internet Operating Environment lays the open, non-proprietary foundation critical to supporting emerging and evolving technology sets in the mobile arena. Bluestone's distributed, pure Java transactioning system further delivers transactional integrity and security for mobile commerce and other mission-critical mobile applications.
At Swisscom, the principal provider of telecommunications services in Switzerland, Bluestone's heritage of high performance and adherence to open standards was the decisive factor in the selection of Bluestone's Total-e-Business platform for its wireless projects. "Swisscom's secure, mobile commerce portal is being built from the ground up to support sustained, aggressive growth," said Urs Loher, head of Mobile e-Business Services for Swisscom. "Such growth demands Bluestone's proven scalability and fault tolerance, as well as its standards-based architecture, which lets us extend our portal with support for the latest protocols and technologies to keep us on the mobile forefront."
Bluestone's Wireless Infrastructure Revealed
The business value at the heart of Bluestone's wireless infrastructure is reducing the time and streamlining the effort required to develop and deploy mission-critical mobile applications. Bluestone backs up this promise with the following industry-leading technologies that comprise mobile computing portal extensions and Bluestone's Internet Operating Environment.
Total-e-Mobile Services
-- Universal Session Manager. The USM creates a server-side
session management proxy, enabling mobile communications
for any device, including ones that do not support cookies
or other locally stored session management information.
-- Trail map. Nine trails provide graduated, step-by-step
tutorial direction that demonstrates key mobile
application services, including use of Client Sensing and
Dynamic XSL Stylesheet Engine. Examples range from a
multi-device "hello, world" through a small e-commerce
example.
-- Reference implementations. Calendar, Contact, and Task
List reference applications -- complete with source code
-- enable customers to study, customize, and use their own
mobile application development. The reference
implementations are built using the Model View Controller
architecture (MVC), making them easy to extend and
maintain.
-- WAP gateway. Infinite Technologies' WAPlite gateway is
included to provide standard WAP 1.1 communications,
allowing customers to easily adapt to and support
alternative mobile communications protocols, such as
DoCoMo, as they become available.
-- WAP and phone emulators. To help developers accurately
test WAP applications, phone emulators from Nokia and
phone.com are included.
Added Bob Bickel, executive vice president of products and executive technology officer for Bluestone Software, "We believe that the training and reference components bundled in our wireless infrastructure are critical to the growth and adoption of mobile solutions. There's just not a lot of experience in the marketplace today in building sophisticated mobile applications that can be hit with any kind of Web-enabled device. Mobile applications require a whole new set of design skills to create usable interfaces for cell phones, PDAs, and other devices with severe screen, storage, input, and bandwidth constraints. We've taken these issues very seriously and produced tutorial and training materials that make it easier for organizations to build robust mobile applications and get them deployed quickly to enjoy the competitive advantages of universal mobile communications."
Continued Swisscom's Loher, "Building a mobile portal is brand new to most developers and Bluestone's step-by-step tutorials and reference implementations are greatly expediting the learning process for our team. As a result, we have been able to dramatically accelerate the time-to-market for our portal."
Bluestone's Internet Operating Environment
-- Bluestone Universal Business Server(TM)is the 100% Pure
Java Application Server deployment engine for delivering
Bluestone's hallmark performance services, such as
Customer-Facing Fault Tolerance, Hot Versioning(TM),
Internet Quality of Service (IQS(TM)), scalability, and
security. Based entirely on J2EE and including robust
implementations of JSP 1.1 and Taglibs, Bluestone
Universal Business Server also features a complete
implementation of Enterprise JavaBeans (EJB) 1.1, Java
Servlets API 2.2, and a Dynamic XSL Stylesheet Engine with
mobile enhancements to let users automatically detect
client device types and generate the proper delivery
format, whether it is a cell phone, palmtop device,
desktop browser, application, or other client type.
-- Bluestone XML-Server(TM) is the advanced XML-based
Integration Server providing robust XML and legacy
integration services to establish an unparalleled level of
mobile integration with existing and emerging e-business
systems.
-- Bluestone Universal Listener Framework(TM) (ULF) is a
unique feature to Bluestone and further automates
application-to-application and application-to-device
interaction. Mobile enhancements to the ULF monitor and
act on data communications transmitted via WAP, email,
FTP, Web, Java Message Service, MQSeries, CICS, broadcast,
multicast, and other services. The ULF supports Guaranteed
Message Delivery to ensure message and document delivery
with quality of service options and Secure Sockets Layer
support for secure communications.
-- Bluestone Application Manager(TM) works in concert with
Bluestone Universal Business Server to automatically scale
applications to meet fluctuating needs, balance loads to
prevent performance decline, provide a fault tolerant
architecture, and manage, control, and report upon all
interactions that transpire across the entire Web
infrastructure. The Bluestone Application Manager is also
the natural interface to world-class enterprise management
systems like HP-OpenView, CA-Unicenter and IBM Tivoli.
-- Bluestone Security Console(TM) creates a common security
framework featuring highly granular control over
e-business applications security, providing role-based
access control at every level. Bluestone Security Console
works with LDAP directories and databases, and supports
X.509 certificates.
-- Bluestone Connector Capability provides a broad array of
application integration services to legacy and commerce
systems.
-- Bluestone J2EE Developer(TM) is the development
environment for creating and deploying EJBs. The
environment automates critical development functions, such
as the creation of home and remote interfaces and
deployment descriptors for EJBs.
-- Bluestone Content Management(TM) lets users manage the
registration and dynamic display of content. In addition,
Bluestone Content Management supports integration with
best-of-breed content authoring systems from third
parties, such as Interwoven, Inc.
-- Bluestone Personalization(TM)includes Bluestone's own
XML-based rules engine for customizing content on a 1-to-1
basis with mobile and wired users. Integration with Net
Perceptions, Inc. is also supported.
-- Bluestone Java Transaction Service(TM) is Bluestone's pure
Java, distributed transactioning system optimized for
mobile commerce applications and other mission-critical
applications that demand transactional integrity and
security.
Bluestone's Total-e-Business platform with mobile services is available today starting at $30,000.
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