Tenon Intersystems : Press Release

WebTen SDK Advances Macintosh Web Development

Universal web plug-in architecture now available for Macintosh developers

Santa Barbara, CA, April 30, 1998. Tenon Intersystems today announced a web software development kit (SDK) that integrates Macintosh and UNIX Apache web development with a universal plug-in architecture. The new development tools let Macintosh developers create web plug-ins that can run on both MacOS and on Rhapsody and let UNIX developers seamlessly move their web applications to MacOS. Because the tools are based on the widely accepted Apache internet web plug-in standard, Macintosh web developers can take advantage of a large body of web tools and back-end web solutions that up until now have either been excluded from the Macintosh platform or needed to be replicated specifically for the Macintosh community. "We are leveling the internet playing field for Macintosh web developers," said Steve Holmgren, President of Tenon. "The Macintosh is a world-class content creation platform. Now, with Tenon's high-performance web server and advanced web development tool suite, we have lowered the barrier for Macintosh to become a world-class content delivery platform."

Tenon's web offering, WebTen, is based on Apache, the most popular web server in the world. Over 850 thousand machines world-wide are running Apache web servers, and hundreds of web tools and web applications have been developed for the Apache architecture. With Tenon's new web development toolkit, all of these Apache modules, as well as commercial Apache-compatible applications can seamlessly be ported to the Macintosh. Macintosh plug-in developers that elect to convert their existing Macintosh-based web tools to the standard Apache interface will have a single, consistent source code base both for MacOS and for Apple's next-generation OS, code named Rhapsody. In addition, they can port their plug-ins to other UNIX and NT Apache implementations and greatly expand their market.

Tenon's new software development environment, the WebTen SDK, is designed to work with either Metrowerks' CodeWarrior or with Tenon's own UNIX OS, MachTen. This means that Macintosh developers can create Apache web server extensions and add-ons using standard Macintosh development tools. And UNIX developers can move their web applications to MacOS using standard UNIX development tools. Later, as Rhapsody becomes available, a straightforward recompilation will transform a MacOS web product to a Rhapsody-based web product. "We were amazed at the ease with which our Apache UNIX version of DynaMorph ported to the native WebTen environment", said Marc Slack, President of Morph Technologies. "Tenon's support of UNIX standards opens up possibilities previously unattainable to the Mac community. We see this as a real boon for the future of the Macintosh as a viable web server."

The underlying foundation of WebTen has been extended to enable new web modules to be dynamically included with WebTen at runtime. WebTen relies on the MacOS Code Fragment Manager to create shared, dynamically loadable modules that implement the Apache module standard. Once created, these modules can be simply dragged and dropped into a "modules" directory for inclusion into WebTen. Webmasters will be able to transform a simple web server with static pages to a full-strength web server, supporting Java server applets and ODBC database accesses with a simple configuration step. One popular Web scripting module, PHP 3.0, has already been created as dynamically linked WebTen Apache module. Additional modules will be ported during a developer beta program. Developers interested in getting a head start with this new architecture can contact Tenon at info@tenon.com. At the conclusion of the beta period, Tenon will make the WebTen SDK and the ported public-domain Apache modules freely available.

Consistent with Tenon's goal to make the Macintosh platform a world-class networking engine, these two new components - an Apache module SDK and a dynamically configurable version of WebTen - allow Macintosh developers to combine the power and strength of UNIX web server tools with the speed, user friendliness and economics of the Macintosh.

Tenon Intersystems is a leader in high-performance networking, UNIX and X software for the Macintosh. Founded in 1989 and located in Santa Barbara, CA, Tenon has developed a suite of products based on their unique "UNIX virtual machine" technology. Products in this series include MachTen, CodeBuilder and XTen. WebTen and NetTen are offerings in a new suite of industrial-strength, "Rhapsody-Ready" internet Macintosh applications.