IBM makes a Rational choice

Almost exactly a year after IBM bought Rational Software, executives from both camps on Wednesday marked the occasion by deepening their common commitment to the IBM Software Development Platform and announcing plans to expand its developer outreach programs that will serve to further bolster that development platform.

IBM also underscored its confidence in Rational to control the strategic direction of its entire development strategy by turning over the responsibility of its WebSphere Studio Toolkit over to them. The move should serve to simplify Big Blue's extensive line of development tools, possibly through repackagings of both company offerings. Company officials declined to say specifically what those packaging changes might be.

About 18 months ago Rational, at the behest of its developers, created its software development platform as a way to speed the creation of applications. That platform featured a common architecture and APIs based around the Eclipse Framework. Rational now intends to speed the integration of that platform to include all of IBM's strategically important tools. Since the acquisition IBM has designated Rational as the engine that will drive the integration of all its development strategies.

"You will see us accelerate the effort over 2004 to include IBM's tools [as part of the Software Development Platform] taking an open standards and open source approach. By the end of next year we will complete that integration," said Mike Devlin, general manager of IBM's Rational division.

Devlin characterized the integration of his company with IBM as having gone "very well" over the first 12 months and that Rational's size has consistently grown over that time. The major benefits of this successful integration, according to Devlin, is that IBM Software has been better able to focus on model-based development, improved the capabilities of its Rational rapid development products, improved its quality of design efforts, and better captured its best practices into a single framework.

Separately, IBM will release updated versions of its WebSphere product line including WebSphere Application Server 5.1, WebSphere Studio 5.1.1, and WebSphere Application Express 5.1. All three will feature support for the Java Development Kit Version 1.4 as well as support for Java Server Faces. The new WebSphere Studio will be released Dec. 30 with the other new versions being available Dec. 19.

Support for the 1.4 version of the JDK means improved security and XML support, better debugging capabilities, and the ability to do hot swapping, meaning developers can change methods of development without having to shut down, according to Bob SutorS director of Web Services Technology for IBM's Websphere.

IBM is also adding Java Server Faces that will allow programmers to carry our drag and drop capabilities from a palette to a Web page. That capability should be available by the end of next year's first quarter, Sutor said.

Over the course of 2004, IBM will hold a developer conference that combines its developerWorks Live! Technical Conference with Rational's Software Developer User Conference to be held in July. The new conference is designed to give developers a chance to improve their skills and gain more technical knowledge about how IBM is integrating its platforms, applications, and tools.