A new integration module links Bluestone Software’s Sapphire/Web application server with Conextions Inc’s Expresso Series legacy integration solution. With Expresso, IS shops can model their mainframe applications so that new development can be carried out with new tools. Kevin Lane, manager of sales for Conextions, calls Expresso: A supercharged high-tech screen-scraping middleware type of tool. Now you know. Expresso is open on both ends, meaning it supports a variety of mainframes at the back and a host of development environments up front, including Java and various Java tools, Visual Basic, C++, Forte and WebObjects. The new software module adds Sapphire/Web to the Java environments supported in Expresso. Bluestone’s Bob Bickle calls the process of rebuilding legacy systems for the web: Application mining. Very often these mainframe applications are the core systems of a company, and there’s a real requirement for them to be web-enabled. The new module expands Bluestone’s stable of mainframe connectivity options. The company already provides native DB2, CICS and MQSeries integration modules and has licensed Sapphire/Web to OpenConnect Systems.
