The Internet is becoming increasingly important in our businesses: It is an ideal, document-oriented, hypertext-based mechanism with which employees and customers can quickly locate and manage information. The first time I sat down to "surf the Web" usin g one of the available search engines, I was excited by how much information I was able to find from sources I never knew existed. I could also communicate directly with individuals who gave me additional clarification and insight. I believe this ability to search for information is what first brings people to the World Wide Web.
However, using the Internet to search for information is only the tip of the proverbial iceberg. In my view, the Internet will provide a client/server infrastructure and platform, and application development tools will soon tightly integrate with it.
Currently, a lot of excitement is focused around companies that provide browsers and client-centric search engines. While these technologies are important, information technology (IT) managers should focus more broadly on client/server software companies that are leveraging their sophistication in application development technology and applying it to the Internet. This column examines the intersection between client/server application development and the Internet.
Internet application development is clearly immature. Therefore, techniques and software currently available for developing client/server applications will also be the foundation for Internet-oriented application development. Companies planning to levera ge the Internet for internal as well as external projects should explore technology from both first- and second-generation client/server tools.
To understand the Internet from an application development perspective, it is important to focus on the areas in which existing technology will play a key role:
For example, client/server software tool vendors such as Forté Software Inc., Dynasty Technologies Inc., Open Environments Corp., Texas Instruments, and Progress Software are all adding Web support to their language-oriented environments. (Most ap plication development tool vendors are starting to tout Web support in their products.) Key database players, including Sybase Inc., Informix Software Inc., and Oracle Corp., are also giving developers the ability leverage their language tools for use wi th the Internet.
In addition, new ventures are beginning to emerge. HAHT Software Inc., a startup out of Raleigh, N.C., has developed a 4GL development environment designed specifically for developing Web-based applications. Microsoft Corp. also intends to be a significa nt player in language-based development on the Internet. While its strategy is still immature, Microsoft plans to leverage both Visual Basic and OLE as foundation tools for developing Internet-enabled applications.
Thus, the leadership in collaborative, Internet-enabled groupware is up for grabs. Although Lotus Notes currently provides the development tools for groupware applications, it is likely that other software vendors will begin to offer comprehensive develo pment tools that provide similar functionality.
Microsoft is rapidly rethinking its groupware strategy. Long term, it plans to turn its office suite into a platform for Web-enabled groupware. However, its strategy is still evolving. It is not clear how long it will take Microsoft to move beyond positi oning Word as the ultimate vehicle for groupware. And, although Netscape purchased Collabra Software Inc. as the foundation for its groupware offering, its product will require massive rewriting before it can compete.
Products that maintain the security requirements of corporations will need to address issues such as encryption, authentication, access control, resource protection, and security management. Currently, individual products handle some of these capabilitie s. However, organizations will have to look to many different vendors to ensure that a Web-based application is secure and safe. The real opportunity for vendors in this market is to integrate all of these capabilities into a single product set. This is the type of functionality that will make organizations much more comfortable working outside their internal firewalls.
Another challenge will be to test Web applications that are viewed via different browsers, each of which supports different capabilities. Many of these applications can be accessed on a wide range of platforms at a variety of networking speeds. These are the types of variables that you must consider in testing.
Providing the services required to build sophisticated applications will require one of two approaches, each with its own set of challenges. First, vendors will have to develop products that are point solutions to a particular need. This is a very straig htforward product development path. However, point-product integration in the client/server application development tool arena has long suffered from a lack of standards and well-defined interfaces. It's difficult to believe this approach will be any les s painful for the integration of Internet-enabled application development products.
The second approach is for vendors to provide a framework for the entire development and runtime environment, along with all supporting services. This approach requires a massive product design and development effort, and will take years to implement. Fu rthermore, distributed platform support exponentially increases the difficulties in building a framework product. The potential returns from Web-distributed business applications are tremendous. However, the industry is a long way from realizing these ap plications or their benefits.
Therefore, market opportunities for Internet application development tools and services exist, but the opportunities come with some heady challenges. Those vendors that can learn from their successes and failures in the client/server arena -- and apply w hat they've learned -- will be big winners in the next wave.