Tenon Intersystems is making lots of announcements regarding Mac OS X and the Web at this week’s Macworld Expo in San Francisco.
First of all, Tenon Intersystems has announced a new version of the Tenon iTools Web Server Suite for Mac OS X Public Beta that’s bundled with the Instant ASP (iASP) from Halcyon.
The iTools Web Server Suite is an Apache-based Web server package takes advantage of the preemptive multitasking and memory protection of OS X, Tenon’s vice president Anita Holmgren told MacCentral. Web Server Suite for Mac OS X is a family of tools essential to “serious, commercial content delivery and eCommerce,” she said. iASP is a Java implementation of the Microsoft Active Server Pages (ASP) framework, used for running and building interactive Web sites.
Tenon’s iTools Web server package for Mac OS X is an evolution of Tenon’s WebTen for Mac OS, said Holmgren. It’s designed to complement and extend the Apache that is included with OS X and to make it easy for Webmasters to set up and support sophisticated network servers. Using Apple’s bundled Apache as a point of departure and incorporating the latest open source protocol implementations of Apache, DNS, FTP and sendmail, iTools extends the OS X platform with a rich set of network services, Holmgren said.
“Now that Tenon’s iTools Web server package includes the extremely flexible and popular ASP programming environment, Tenon and Halcyon are providing a full-fledged Web development system for Mac OS X, Apple’s next generation operating system,” Holmgren added.
Halcyon’s iASP, winner of ASP Guild’s Top Tool for 2000 award, lets developers deploy Web applications using the Microsoft Active Server Pages Framework. iASP includes support for VBScript and JScript and interfaces with multiple component architectures, including JavaBeans, EJB, JSP, Java Servlet, and all JDBC database engines.
Included with iTools are a WEBmail server, a state-of-the-art domain name server, a multihoming FTP server, a SSL encryption engine with tiered-certificate support for eCommerce, a caching engine with state-of-the-art proxy support, a Sherlock-savvy search engine, and FastCGI to provide high-performance Perl and CGI execution. The WEBmail tool turns Mac OS X into a complete POP3, IMAP4, fully customizable, anytime, anywhere “hotmail” style mail server, according to Holmgren.
The FTP tool includes support for virtual FTP hosts, password protected FTP and anonymous FTP. The iTools Web server package is mature, integrated and scalable and all of the networking services are supported using a point and click, browser-based administration tool, enabling system administrators and webmasters to manage their Web servers remotely using any Internet browser, Holmgren said.
“iTools provides the power and flexibility of an advanced graphical user interface, while still leaving the native configuration files accessible,” she added.
iTools with iASP for OS X will ship as soon as Apple releases OS X. A preliminary version of iTools for OS X is available now as a downloadable public beta. The iTools suite of downloadable packages includes: PHP 4 (a scripting tool), Tomcat (for Java Servlets and Java Server Pages), SSL (for secure eCommerce), three database engines (MySQL, FrontBase, and OpenBase), and the new iASP package.
Meanwhile, Tenon’s iTools 6.0 will include a new version of WEBmail. iTools WEBmail is compatible with SMTP mail servers so the WEBmail client can POP or IMAP mail from any SMTP mail server and any mail client can POP or IMAP mail from the WEBmail mail server. The WEBmail client can be hand-tailored with unique logos and banner advertising on a virtual host-by-virtual host basis, Holmgren said.
Tenon’s iTools WEBmail was developed by EMUmail, a vendor of Web-based mail systems. The new WEBmail supports multiple attachments, address books, user definable folders, outbox for sent messages, real-time SPAM filtering using the “Real-Time Blackhole” list of known SPAMmers, customizable tag line for site branding, blind carbon copy, spell check, quoted reply, forwarding, per-user or per-domain message quotas, an per-user or per-domain access restrictions. Plus, WEBmail supports FastCGI for optimized performance.
Finally, Tenon and Aestiva are releasing four Web site applications designed to help folks give their Web sites more functionality. The applications are LiveHelp, HelpMate, Tell-A-Friend and Knowledge Base. They’ll be shipping with iTools 6.0 for operation on Mac OS X and will later be available for other platforms.
LiveHelp is a pop-up chat window that’ s added to a Web site to provide live technical support and/or sales support services. HelpMate “supercharges” a Web site with “popup help” windows. Tell-A-Friend is a marketing component designed to help visitors instantly spread the word about a Web site. Knowledge Base lets you add a searchable database to a site. The products include point-and-click administration and include free installation help so outside technical assistance isn’t needed.
“These add-ons offer advanced technology and are fully point-and-click so they can be used by anyone wishing to improve their site,” Holmgren said. ” The products give businesses affordable access to valuable applications too costly to develop. They allow businesses to build Web sites that compete effectively against those with enterprise budgets.”
The new applications are an outgrowth of Aestiva’s “NET-anywhere” initiative. Launched late last year, NET-anywhere is a campaign dedicated to the principle that software applications can be hosted on any Internet Hosting Provider and with any kind of Web server, according to D.M.Silverberg, Director of Technology for Aestiva.
“The future of the Web lies with affordable components one can add to any Web site,” said Silverberg.
Coupling iTools with Aestiva’s new Web add-ons “significantly” enhances the capability of Tenon’s Web management tools and moves the company closer to its goal of a complete solution for Mac Webmasters, said Holmgren.