Meet the Object Web Players

A new coalition is building around the CORBA/Java Object Web. The Web transforms CORBA/Java from a set of standards to a set of products that fulfills an intergalactic need. To use a shopping mall analogy, the anchor stores of the CORBA Object Web are Netscape, Oracle, JavaSoft, and IBM/Lotus. This mall is also populated with hundreds of software vendors that provide the boutiques and specialty stores -- including specialized object request brokers (ORBs), tools, components, and services. There should be enough critical mass to attract the shoppers with the dollars: independent software vendors, IT shops, and consumers of software.

Netscape is making CORBA ubiquitous on the client. It is bundling the VisiBroker for Java ORB with every browser. Netscape is also using CORBA for its server-to-server infrastructure. Potentially, Netscape can distribute over 40 million CORBA ORBs on the cli ent and over a million CORBA ORBs on the server. CORBA also allows Netscape servers to play with other servers in the enterprise.

Oracle has adopted CORBA as the platform for its Network Computing Architecture. Oracle's entire software line, from the database engines to stored procedures, tools, and the Internet, will be built on a CORBA object bus. For example, the database engine will be componentized using CORBA. Third parties will be able extend the database using CORBA components called Cartridges. Oracle is building most of the CORBA Services on top of the Visigenic IIOP ORB. This ORB will first appear in the next release of Oracle Web Server; it will serve as the foundation for Oracle's Internet products.

JavaSoft is making CORBA the foundation for distributed Java. SunSoft is building its Internet server strategy around CORBA using its NEO ORB and Solstice.

IBM/Lotus is building its cross-platform network computing infrastructure on CORBA/Java. IBM intends to bundle a Java run-time with all its OS platforms. The IBM VisualAge tool will target CORBA/Java objects on both clients and servers across all the IBM platforms. The IBM Component Broker is a scalable server-side component coordinator for managing middle-tier CORBA/Java objects. Finally, the next Lotus Domino is being built on an IIOP foundation.

The boutiques include veteran CORBA players like Apple, HP, SunSoft, Iona, Digital, Novell, and Expersoft. This camp also includes ODBMS vendors -- for example, ODI, GemStone, and Versant. Vendors of transaction processing monitors are now morphing ORBs with traditional TP monitors -- for example, BEA is buil ding a scalable CORBA-based TP monitor on top of Tuxedo. The boutiques also include tool vendors -- such as Symantec, ParcPlace, Borland, Penumbra, and Sybase -- and big IT shops. This group also includes the major ISVs that gravitate in the Netscape, IBM, JavaSoft, and Oracle orbits.