IBM to resell tool that lets .Net programmers build software for WebSphere

IBM signed on Monday an agreement to resell Mainsoft Corp.'s new .Net Extensions for WebSphere Portal product that will allow companies to use .Net to create Java applications for IBM's WebSphere portal.

IBM expects that the tools will help its customers integrate Windows SharePoint Services, Office document libraries, SQL Server Reports and .Net applications into IBM's WebSphere Portal Server without the need for Java developers, the two companies said.

Mainsoft CEO Yaacov Cohen said that the deal is aimed at helping companies that have installed SharePoint portals at the departmental level to leverage the WebSphere enterprise portal.

"Organizations can break the silos of information and take the valuable information from SharePoint sites and make this information able to participate in composite applications," he said. "For the first time, you get composite applications across .Net and Java. The idea is to enable organizations to achieve portal-to-portal interoperability using WebSphere portal as a kind of uber portal, which will federate SharePoint departmental sites."

Healthways Inc., a Nashville-based provider of health care support services, began using the Mainsoft technology in April to build a WebSphere portal for its 27 million customers, said David Jarmoluk, director of enterprise architecture at Healthways. The company wanted to leverage its Microsoft programmers for the portal, but didn't think SharePoint would scale well enough for the job, he said.

So, the company used the Mainsoft's Visual Studio-based .Net Extensions for WebSphere Portal product to allow its Microsoft programmers to develop and put into production dozens of .Net applications in the portal without having to rewrite them in Java, he noted.

Jarmoluk said that developers were able to continue using the Visual Studio environment they best understood, and that the company therefore didn't have to hire any Java programmers. He estimated that the tool set saved the company 30% to 35% in time and costs compared with adding new Java developers, he noted.

"It is all about usability from a developer standpoint and being able to leverage the expertise we already have," he said. "There are a lot of costs and overhead associated with trying to train people and get them up to speed with a new thing. We were able to significantly reduce that by letting our developers continue to use what they already know."

Dell XPS One strips the tease

After teasing the public for a while, Dell on Friday revealed an all-in-one computer that combines the monitor and CPU in one box.

The XPS One will be available as a system with only a widescreen display, a mouse and a keyboard. Processing capabilities and other components will be fixed inside the display.

The systems will be available in four designs with the monikers indicating the target audience: the Essential One, the Music One, the Performance One and the Entertainment One.

All systems will come with 20-inch displays, Intel Core 2 Duo processors, Windows Vista Home Premium, hard drives starting at 250G bytes, 2G bytes of memory, a TV tuner and remote control. The Music One system will come with wireless headphones for music enthusiasts.

The Entertainment One, designed as a home media center, will include a Blu-ray high-definition DVD burner. It will also come with an ATI Radeon HD 2400 Pro graphics card with 256M bytes of memory.

Popularized by Apple's iMac, all-in-one PCs also have been released by Hewlett-Packard and Gateway.

Dell had planned to release the XPS One on Monday but posted details about it early online. The company declined to offer any additional information about the computer on Friday.

An XPS One was visible onstage behind Michael Dell, CEO of Dell, when he addressed an audience at the OpenWorld conference earlier this week. He didn't give details about the product at the time, only saying it would be released next week.

The product is on pre-sale on Dell's Web site.