BOSTON (08-01-95) - The Open Software Foundation (OSF) recently announced the Open Software Mall -- a World Wide Web-based software repository implemented by OSF to aid in distributing open systems technology to users.
Services available through the Software Mall will include multimedia on-line descriptions of OSF software and the automatic means to download them, as well as documentation for the latest technology in online hypermedia format. Through a forms-based facility, OSF will be able to get feedback from users who have retrieved and tried out the experimental software packages.
The Software Mall will be organized by "plazas," each of which will make available technologies produced by one of OSF's development processes. Each plaza will have "stores" that offer particular technologies, such as DCE Web or Motif. The stores will provide access to source code, object code, documentation, specifications, test suites, comments and licenses. Each plaza will also have its own process for inclusion, distribution and licensing of the technologies.
At its inception, the Open Software Mall will include four plazas: OSF Research Institute, Advanced Technology Offering (ATO), pre-Structure Technology (PST), and OSF Professional Services. More plazas will be added eventually, OSF officials said.
"We have numerous ideas for more ATOs," said Ira Goldstein, chief scientist and executive vice president of OSF. "Every month some number are going to go out for review and consideration."
In the ATO plaza, technology will be available for non-commercial use. Through a standard mall license, users will be able to download, use and evaluate technology in-house, but they will not be permitted to use source code in commercial products.
Three ATOs are already available. The first, DEC Web, is an application that will allow the Web to use DEC mechanisms for improved naming, security and access control. The second, JAVA ports, is a series of ports and evaluations of this technology to new platforms. Finally, a Microkernel Unification Offering provides a specification and conformance, as well as performance test suites, to assure that microkernel implementations support common a application programming interface.
An ATO is generally expected to have a nine-month life cycle consisting of three-month incremental releases.
An ATO is generally a US$300,000 to $600,000 project that lasts six to nine months and involves three to six engineers. The price quoted is a not- to-exceed number for the minimum number of investors required to do the project. Investors will get unrestricted commercial rights to the software developed in the Mall.
The Software Mall can be accessed from a pointed on the OSF Web page. OSF, which is based in Cambridge, Mass, can be reached at (617) 621-8700. The company also has offices in Brussels, Grenoble, Tokyo.
[Copyright 1995 IDG News Service, International Data Group Inc. All rights reserved.]