The new IBM: a look under the hood

IBM has definitely changed some of the fundamental ways it thinks about things. Big Blue now not only preaches but practices heterogeneity, and it also is willing to license nearly any technological jewel. These two factors may give IBM an advantage in playing by the new industry rules that increasingly discard/eschew the NIH (not invented here) syndrome in favor of the mantra that proliferation of its technology increases the attractiveness of IBM products in the heterogeneous world.

IBM loves ebusiness for several reasons:

* Ebusiness is the pheromone that attracts customers to IBM in engagements that tend to involve consultative and integration skills from its services group as well as discrete products.

* Ebusiness often involves a soup-to-nuts restructuring, modernizing, and integration of different aspects of a company's business. Often, customer resource management is the initial reason customers approach IBM.

* IBM studies show that IBM is much more frequently associated with ebusiness than other companies, indicating its branding campaign has been successful.

IBM's concept of ecommerce includes four elements, as can be seen in Figure 6.

As one would expect, IBM is intent upon developing an application framework that will serve it in development and integration of applications. It's also a handy way of viewing how IBM intends to play in the thin client era of what it calls pervasive computing [ILLUSTRATION FOR FIGURE 7 OMITTED]. IBM plans to construct industry applications on top of the framework.

In addition, IBM expects its Web application server business will be on the same scale as its database business.

When IBM mentions heterogeneity, it knows the definition. There was a gasp from analysts at IBM's recent briefing when a speaker said IBM does DB2 builds nightly on 17 platforms in 12 languages.

IBM is using its middleware skills to construct an application framework layer to enable applications to run across multiple platforms. This will be very useful in the pervasive computing scheme with thin clients and the resultant split between application elements.

IBM was one of the several vendors at Java One that implemented a standards application that tests servers to ensure that applications will run on several Web servers.

IBM is supporting Java on many fronts. In addition to adding Java to its MQSeries, IBM recently announced a JVM implementation for Linux, available for download from its alphaWorks site, www.alphaworks.ibm.com. Alphaworks is analogous to IBM's incubator for new developments that IBM is offering to the industry in hopes of increased feedback and acceptance. For example, there is an XML parser offered on the site. If one needs proof of the new ways at IBM, look no further than alphaWorks.

And IBM is open for business in selling components of both the hardware and software variety. Folks from the new Sun/Netscape venture gleefully told The Gray Sheet they expect to implement IBM's TX Series in the NAS 4.0 server due in July this year. TX supports nested transactions and can handle distributed transactions to PCs, Sun said. Informix is also licensing TX Series. In addition, Sun and IBM are joint marketing DB2 as well as DB2 OLAP server and IBM's Intelligent Miner. CICS has been supported since a previous release of the NetDynamics server. Given this level of software commonality, might MQSeries be next?

IBM's OEM hardware deals, such as PowerPC chips for Nintendo and disk drives for EMC, get the press coverage, but the software may be more important for the industry long term.

TWO CENTRAL THEMES

IBM appears to have two central themes in its application server products that occur mainly in its middleware: transaction processing and connectivity via use of open APIs and standards. These capabilities are central to the success of ecommerce. IBM's thought appears to be that the more widely its technology is in use, the more easily its systems will connect with others, and the existence of more functional systems will drive the market's growth.

In the transaction arena, TXSeries is playing an increasingly central role with connections to both CICS and the Transaction Processing Facility (TPF, the engine behind many airline reservation systems). TPF is also integrated with WebSphere. Both CICS and TPF have proven themselves in the transactional arena.

It's important to note that IBM is embracing Java in a major way in order to provide MQSeries and other tools the ability to interface widely with the rest of the world.

MQSeries, IBM's middleware based on asynch messaging, is an integral element of IBM's design to promote business integration. IBM wants to make MQSeries the intermediary of choice for business integration.

For example, MQSeries will be sprouting wings and expanding beyond PCs and computers and will be found in smart phones and other appliances in the future.

IBM is enhancing MQSeries by adding:

* XML to position MQSeries as the bridge between XML and heterogeneous enterprise.