SAN MATEO (12-05-95) - While happy vendors sing about one world, one LAN, corporations struggle with the rapid and chaotic transformation of the Internet and the World Wide Web into a platform that can support core business practices. Taking just one piece of the Web equation -- linking to and developing database applications -- will lead you to a dizzying array of options.
Databases can transform the more static nature of Web pages to an environment that changes "on the fly" based on user profiles, database rules, search parameters, or any other criteria. Database applications that collect data on customers are also a gold mine of target marketing information. In fact, analysts say the database nirvana is being able to create applications that know about individual users when they log in and that configure the Web page accordingly.
The potential of the Internet as an internal corporate network and an external commercial platform is fueling the invention of many tools that promise to bring this nirvana a step closer to reality. One important segment consists of tools and environments that offer the potential for robust development of database-enabled Web applications. Recent strategies and upcoming products from Oracle Corp., Sybase Inc., IBM, and Netscape Communications Corp. all fall into this area. There is also a growing list of middleware and wrapper products that can enable Hypertext Mark-up Language (HTML)-to-SQL translation and Web access to legacy databases.
"You can make the assumption that any [vendor of a] major development environment will develop a hook to the Web," says Eric Brown, software strategy analyst at Forrester Research Inc., in Cambridge, Mass.
Today the quest of many database, middleware, and Internet vendors is to facilitate this capability. The challenge to IS professionals is first to decide what applications are appropriate to develop, either internally, externally, or business to business. Next, they must sort out the hype from the reality, get a handle on the methods that are proposed by vendors, and avoid being locked into proprietary solutions.
Complicating the job is the fact that vendors will position themselves as offering the only -- or best, or most integrated, or most open -- way to develop database applications on the Web, warns Dan Kusnetzky, research director for Unix and server operating environments at International Data Corp., in Framingham, Mass.
"It's very easy to get drawn into an approach offered by Oracle or Sybase or Informix [Software Inc.] and come to believe that it has to be done that way. The truth is, there are many ways, no right way, and all have benefits and weaknesses," Kusnetzky says.
Systems professionals need to ask themselves practical questions: What is our development environment now? What tools do we feel comfortable using? Is the application database-centric in the first place? What is our in-house expertise?
SOUP TO NUTS. So far there appear to be two approaches to building database-enabled Web applications. The first is to use a suite of integrated tools, servers, and even template applications that address most, or all, of the environment. This is the approach taken by Oracle, Netscape, and others.
Netscape has announced two development tools, Live Wire and Live Wire Pro, that incorporate Sun Microsystems Inc.'s Java development language and a scripting language aimed at Powersoft Corp. PowerBuilder and Microsoft Corp. Visual Basic developers. The Pro version of Live Wire includes a database connectivity layer to link to relational database management system (RDBMS) products from Informix, Sybase, and Oracle.
"We are promoting the concept of having a Web application development environment," says Atri Chatterjee, director of service product marketing at Netscape.
But at least one analyst cautions users on adopting Netscape's environment.
"Netscape has a lot of money and a lot of technology in the communications area, but in the applications area they are starting from point zero," says Curt Monash, editor and publisher of the Monash Software Report, in New York.
"The problem is the Web is essentially C language-based and academically minded," Monash says. "Internet vendors are speaking from tremendous ignorance of commercial data processing."
Oracle has released a suite of tools that lets users link existing Oracle databases to Web server-based applications.
Oracle's Internet server is an integrated software suite that includes an Oracle7 database, Oracle's Web browser, a separate Web server, and agent technology. The agents will allow data to be passed back and forth among any standard Web browser, Oracle's Web server, and the Oracle7 database, converting HTML data into Oracle PL-SQL language requests and back.
Hugo Toledo Jr., a consultant and developer at Sarasvati Systems Corp., in Chicago, says that with Oracle's server-side processing approach -- using stored procedures and database triggers to write programs -- not only can you develop applications using technology you have already invested in, but you can take advantage of the investment you have made in business rules, data structures, and security.
What about claims that Netscape's and Oracle's approaches are proprietary? Kusnetzky says both companies have been very careful to support every major international standard of management and connectivity. They have gateways that allow them to exist in environments of almost any type you care to name, he says.
Netscape and Oracle won't preclude you from using other products. They will simply point out that theirs will integrate better and will have features that can only be taken advantage of within their environment, Kusnetzky says.
Oracle has a time jump on the other major RDBMS vendors with these products, and its solutions may be a better bet than technology coming from other vendors, says analyst Brown. But any vendor with database products will have a leg up on Internet-only vendors, he says.
"The relational vendors have recognized that they have the corporate information and they can provide IT organizations with new ways of dissemination. It is easier for companies such as Informix, Sybase, IBM, and Lotus [Development Corp.] to add Web capability to their core capabilities than for a second-tier Web player to build applications and database technology," Brown says.
MIDDLEWARE TOOLS. The second approach to Web-enabling databases involves middleware translation tools. These solutions allow Web developers to tie existing databases to their Web servers without buying into a suite of applications.
"There are a lot of vendors in that middle space, including Spider Technologies Inc., Bluestone Inc., and Microrim Inc.," Brown says.
Analyst Kusnetzky says companies are moving slowly into these waters, developing small pilot projects to test the technology.
"Many companies are getting their feet wet to see if they like the temperature of the water and if there are many piranha in there," Kusnetzky says.
That is the case at Investors Group Financial Services Inc., in Winnipeg, Manitoba, where programmers are running pilots and testing Spider 1.1, a visual development environment from Spider Technologies Inc., in Palo Alto, Calif., says Morgan Ross, programmer analyst and project leader for Internet applications.
Spider is Unix based but simplifies the process of connecting to databases via the Web by eliminating the need for Common Gateway Interface scripting and providing a drag-and-drop development environment.
The company took a subset of its Informix-based internal account RDBMS and connected it to the Web.
"We were putting up client account data. While the application was all internal to the network, it used Internet protocols [so programmers could] see if the technology worked," Ross explains.
The demonstration builds "on-the-fly" SQL requests through HTML templates. It provides the ability to update the database dynamically in real time, Ross says.
The application also benefited from a separate effort within the company to port data from its mainframe to a client/server environment.
Ross says development with Spider was easy -- the company's HTML writer picked it up and did most of the work, although the IS group had to write some stored procedures to manage the size of the database.
Using IBM's Internet gateways, which provide links to CICS and DB2 databases, isn't as easy but is worth it, says Steve Ware, computer systems coordinator at the University of Florida, in Gainesville. The university is using IBM's CICS Internet gateway, part of IBM's Internet Connection family, to Web-enable data from a variety of applications and sources. Another project uses a beta version of IBM's DB2 World Wide Web Connection.
Ware suggests that it is not as easy to use any database-Web connection products as vendors make it sound. He is concerned with security and privacy as well as issues such as installation, maintenance, debugging, and performance.
"[These issues] make it a much more complicated environment. The whole idea is to make it easy for the end-user, but it is not as easy for the developer," Ware says.
But it's worth it.
"We are merging the new multimedia world into the legacy world. With CICS Internet Gateway you can enhance your applications, add [Uniform Resource Locators], and add Web-type media," Ware says. The university is attempting to provide both public access to a library information system in a VSAM database and also private data access.
"Through the Web interface, we can catalog information, provide text and pictures, and make gigabytes of information available to anyone with a Web browser," Ware says. The first project for private, or internal, data is to create the ability to allow students to register for classes on-line.
Programmer analyst Gary Wong, at Tribune Information Systems, in Chicago, is sorting through the many available choices to figure out how to develop an on-line classified advertising application for a number of the Tribune's newspapers across the country. The company is considering solutions offered by Oracle and Informix, as well as Lotus InterNotes and FrontPage 1.0 from Cambridge, Mass.-based Vermeer Technologies Inc., but the lack of standards among the newspapers has made the decision more difficult.
"All the classified advertising systems are different. We need to come up with a uniform standard and port them into a client/server system. That is probably our biggest hurdle," Wong says.
Wong adds that the company is purposely taking it slow.
"It is a revenue issue. There are a lot of security concerns when [opening up] your database to the Internet. Anything you have you have to be willing to lose, or protect it in a big way," Wong says.
Analyst Monash also warns against rushing to adopt these tools, because they are relatively new and the management pieces of the equation are not yet available.
"In the short term, I wouldn't use the Web to go against well- structured databases. I'd use it to get word processing documents into a public arena or for applications that I would have considered Lotus Notes for," he says.
WHAT'S A WEBMASTER TO DO? There are valid arguments for using either of the two database-to-Web approaches, but choosing the right one will depend on whether it is more important to have the best of the breed, which using middleware products allows you to do, or to keep your site's management requirements to a minimum.
Analyst Kusnetzky offers one way to look at the trade-offs of the different approaches: The integrated approach offered by Oracle and others would be easier to install and manage. In addition, it is likely that Oracle will work out what it takes to make the products usable and manageable on an enterprise level, he says. A system from Oracle will be more expensive than a best-of-breed setup in up-front costs, but it will reduce the overall cost of personnel for software management.
Kusnetzky says selecting best-of-breed products for each necessary function, including Web server software, database, middleware, management software, and development tools, may result in a lower overall cost for software.
The downside is that it is horrendously difficult for the site managers to determine what is the best of the breed, Kusnetzky says. And the ability to manage and control that environment is another problem, one that will be expensive in terms of personnel costs.
(Emily Leinfuss is a free-lance writer based in Sarasota, Fla.)
SIDEBAR: Be Careful with that Data By InfoWorld staff (InfoWorld)
SAN MATEO (Dec. 5) - The proliferation of business over the Internet raises a cautionary flag for Webmasters -- particularly the use of database-enabled Web applications that capture information on customers. And it is the job of the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) in San Francisco to point that out to developers.
"As businesses start making decisions, they need to understand that the internal and external usage of capturing information is a truly double- edged sword," says Lori Fena, executive director of EFF. "They are making usage and product decisions, but they are also making important social and cultural decisions." A database that captures personal information may be a marketer's dream, but on the flip side it is a personal privacy nightmare, she says.
One way to think about it is, what if the ability to collect data on individuals were used not just for target marketing, but by the government?
"If the political realm were to change, these databases could be used in negative ways -- people tracking other people down and ostracizing them for their political or sexual preferences," explains Eric Tachibana, on- line service coordinator for the EFF.
The EFF recommends that companies give people notice that data on them is being captured. Currently, most people don't understand that this is happening, Fena says. She suggests the following:
--Be direct and open about what information is being collected;
--Make sure people understand the implications of how and where the data will be used; and
--Post policies and make sure people understand them.
Fena also suggests that Web developers ask themselves the following question: Are we creating an electronic world that we would want to live in? SIDEBAR: Before the Flood By InfoWorld staff (InfoWorld)
SAN MATEO (Dec. 5) - Dun & Bradstreet Information Services, in Parsippany, N.J., wanted to tie its Dunslink database to the World Wide Web, but at the time no off-the-shelf solutions existed. So it wrote a gateway in-house, using Smalltalk and some C code.
The application provides customers a link to information about 11 million companies, which it holds in its corporate databases. It also lets users register their own names and addresses. The user inputs search criteria, either by company name, address, city, state, phone number, or Data Universal Numbering System Number (a unique nine-digit number assigned in order to track a company throughout the life of the business), and it returns with an appropriate list.
The application accesses Dunslink, Dun & Bradstreet's internal access layer that pulls together data from ISAM, VSAM, and some DB2 databases. Dunslink was a functioning communications access engine before it was Web enabled, says Tom Thornbury of the electronic commerce group at D&B.
Thornbury says D&B is currently evaluating new products to enhance its systems.
[Copyright 1995 InfoWorld (US), International Data Group Inc. All rights reserved.]