Rocket U2 has announced UniData 7.3. The first major UniData release since the U2 group was acquired by Rocket Software from IBM, UniData 7.3 represents over a year of work on a combination of development and QA. A major release of UniVerse, release 11.1, was also released in 2010.
UniData 7.3 delivers U2 Dynamic Objects (UDO), which enables an easier way to exchange data with web services and further extends the value of a UniData application. UDO also allows users to easily provide or consume data in JSON format. In addition, replication with External Database Access (EDA) can be used to replicate data to a SQL database on the same server. Organizations can store data in UniData, with it simultaneously replicated to Oracle, Microsoft SQL Server, or IBM DB2 for data-mining or reporting. The release also includes the U2 MetaData Manager (U2 MDM), a drag and drop mapping tool that is expected to eventually replace the Visual Schema Generator that is part of UniData.
With this release, says Susie Siegesmund, vice president and general manager, U2 Brand, Rocket Software, U2 is also answering the request from some customers for data typing. Data type enforcement will provide an optional check on data written to file in order assure that only valid data is stored. The initial data type enforcement capability will be augmented with additional functionality when the 7.3.1 release comes out in June, Siegesmund notes.
Another new key offering is U2 RESTful Web Services, says Siegesmund. Rocket U2 recently changed its way of releasing clients and tools to separate them from the database delivery package. And, instead of labeling them as UniData or UniVerse, Rocket U2 now releases U2 clients and DB tools that work for both databases, and these are based on the Eclipse development platform. While not technically part of the 7.3 release, the recent tools release included the U2 RESTful Web Services that were developed alongside the 7.3 release, Siegesmund notes. "The neat thing about U2 RESTful Web Services is that it allows you to use dynamic languages to write programs that will run on UniData or UniVerse so people can use Python or Ruby on Rails, whatever they want to use to write programs. We are looking toward this being the way we are going to open the door to get younger, more modern developers to build new applications using the data servers."
For more information, go to http://www.rocketsoftware.com/u2