PRODUCT ANNOUNCEMENT: NewEra 3.1 is Generally Available

*************************************************************************** To: Informix User Group Members From: David Gremer, NewEra Product Manager Date: September 22, 1997 Regarding: NewEra 3.1 is Generally Available *************************************************************************** ANNOUNCEMENT SUMMARY -------------------- INFORMIX-NewEra 3.1 is generally available. INFORMIX-NewEra is an object-oriented language and a highly graphical, component-based, client/server application development environment. NewEra enables developers to build multi-tiered database applications for deployment on Microsoft Windows, UNIX Motif, or character-based terminals. NewEra 3.1 opens NewEra to industry standards; it supports connection from Java clients to the NewEra Application Server, and it enables the reuse of OCX's (open component executables) created in other languages such as Visual Basic and C++. OCX's allow "drag and drop" reuse of complex objects that "visualize" user-defined types. NewEra 3.1 features a more robust system with enhanced error detection and improved recovery of repository problems. The NewEra application server no longer requires the use of Motif, so application servers can have a smaller footprint and fewer installation issues. Table of Contents ----------------- 1.0 Product Overview 2.0 Key Features 3.0 Bundle Information 3.1 Compatibility Matrix 4.0 Product Requirements 4.1 Hardware Requirements 4.2 Software Requirements 5.0 Platform Availability 5.1 Language Support 6.0 Upgrade and Trade-up Policies 7.0 Frequently Asked Questions 8.0 Other Resources 8.1 Training Availability 8.2 Release Notes ANNOUNCEMENT DETAILS -------------------- 1.0 Product Overview - NewEra developers can now use OCX custom events in their NewEra application making NewEra "open" to the re-usable application component standard. - The NewEra Application Server now supports all popular clients: Microsoft Office, Excel, Word, Visual Basic, C++, Java, Web, etc. Also, users can now "Web-enable" their applications (i.e. utilize Java in their Web browser) and connect to the NewEra Application Server. Application developers can model complex middle-tiered database business logic with the NewEra language. Furthermore, UNIX application servers no longer require Motif runtime libraries for development or deployment of NewEra applications. 2.0 Key Features The key features that have been included in NewEra 3.1 include: OCX Custom Events OCX custom events can be handled within NewEra with the 3.1 release. Windows developers rely upon OCX's as the reusable application component standard. NewEra developers can now create a NewEra wrapper for OCX custom events via a Class Wizard in the Window Painter. This wizard will automatically register the OCX custom events within the Window Painter, allowing the NewEra developer to add NewEra handlers to customize OCX events just as they would for native NewEra classes. INFORMIX-NewEra 3.1 support of OCX custom events allows the NewEra developer to fully utilize the large number of OCX's in the marketplace to visualize user-defined types. Open Application Server With previous releases of NewEra, the Application Servers provided services to NewEra clients as well as to OLE automation clients that can be written with Visual C++, PowerBuilder, or Microsoft's Visual Basic. With the NewEra 3.1 release, the Application Server has been extended to service *any* Java client. Thus, any Java application that is written with Symantec Visual Cafe, Microsoft's J++, or INFORMIX-Data Director for Java, can call upon the services of an Application Server residing on a UNIX or NT platform. Application developers using third party tools can now parse their application logic by using NewEra Application Server. NewEra 3.1 release has extended the Application Partitioning Wizard to generate Java client-side code that allows for communication to the NewEra Application Server. Motif-less Application Server (UNIX) UNIX Application Servers in previous NewEra releases had a dependency on the Motif runtime libraries for event processing. This dependency has been removed. INFORMIX-NewEra Application Servers in the 3.1 release will no longer require the existence of Motif runtime libraries on the development or deployment platform. Unix-based NewEra Application Servers should now be more convenient to use. 3.0 Bundle Information INFORMIX-NewEra 3.1 release will continue to bundle the INFORMIX-SE engine and Intersolv 2.5 ODBC drivers for Informix, Sybase, and Oracle for Windows95 and Windows NT. The NewEra 3.1 release offers two types of deployment systems, NewEra 3.1 Base Deployment Libraries and NewEra 3.1 Deployment Libraries. The bundled contents of these products are as follows: NE 3.1 Development NE 3.1 Base Deploy Libraries NE 3.1 Deploy Libraries ------------------ ---------------------------- ----------------------- NewEra 3.1 NewEra 3.1 NewEra 3.1 (development) (runtime libraries) (runtime libraries) INFORMIX-ESQL/C 9.12* INFORMIX-ESQL/C 9.12* INFORMIX-ESQL/C 9.12* INFORMIX-Open 2.5 INFORMIX-Open 2.5 INFORMIX-SE 7.20 INFORMIX-SE 7.20 You may opt for Deployment Libraries over Base Deployment Libraries if you need to have another database (I-SE) to run a deployed application, or to connect to a larger database, possibly a non-Informix engine, to run a deployed application. The bundled contents of the NewEra Application Server are as follows: NewEra Application Server 3.1 Development ----------------------------------------- NewEra 3.1 Application Server (development) INFORMIX-ESQL/C 9.12* INFORMIX-Open 2.5 *INFORMIX-ESQL/C 9.12 is not separately orderable. 3.1 Compatibility Matrix INFORMIX-NewEra 3.1 release will support the following Informix database servers: Win 95 Win NT UNIX ------ ------ ---- INFORMIX-SE 5.x n/a n/a yes 7.x yes yes yes INFORMIX-OnLine 5.x n/a n/a yes INFORMIX-OnLine Dynamic Server 7.x n/a yes yes INFORMIX-OnLine Workgroup Server 7.x n/a yes yes INFORMIX-OnLine Workstation 7.x n/a yes n/a INFORMIX-OnLine Extended Parallel Server 8.x n/a no yes INFORMIX-Universal Server 9.x n/a no yes In addition, the INFORMIX-NewEra 3.1 release can access the following non-Informix database servers via ODBC access: Oracle 7.16, 7.2x Sybase 10.x, 11.x 4.0 Product Requirements 4.1 Hardware Requirements Development Systems These specific