There has been a lot of speculation in the industry about the future of
Smalltalk, given two relatively recent events:
- The dropping of active development of the Digitalk-related products by
ParcPlace-Digitalk.
- The phenomenal focus on the Java language by the industry as a whole.
In
an effort to try to get an update on the state of the Smalltalk industry, Eye on
Objects magazine contacted a number of Smalltalk vendors in the industry.
Here's a summary of the results we've obtained (there may be a followup article
in the next issue):
IBM SmalltalkIBM's Smalltalk product set and plans keep moving forward
with a positive perspective, even though the corporation is spending enormous
effort on Java-related products.
According to Peter Spung, VisualAge for Smalltalk Product Development
Manager, VisualAge for Smalltalk has continued its sales growth in 1997,
with a 225% growth over 1995 and 105% growth over 1996 (through the second
quarter). Peter said that IBM intends to support the Smalltalk product
indefinitely into the future.
As far as Java is concerned, IBM's "intention is to have good,
high-speed interoperability between Java and Smalltalk in the same virtual
machine." This is widely known to be supported by the Universal Virtual
Machine (UVM) that is to be included in a future release of the VisualAge
for Smalltalk and VisualAge for Java products.
Peter sees the Smalltalk development environment as having an edge over
other OO language choices for the near future, including:
- A robust, mature persistence framework
- Rapid business modeling support
- Client-server with a thin client
Future plans for
VisualAge for Smalltalk
include:
- More servers, including "middle tier and traditional hosts"
- Integrated modeling tools, supporting the UML methodology
- A new persistence framework, based on the current Smalltalk Data Gateway
ParcPlace Smalltalk There has been a recent infusion of new management
at the top levels of ParcPlace-Digitalk...and a new name next month - ObjectShare,
Inc. after its subsidiary. According to Jim Smith, the VP of worldwide sales
and marketing, the company will focus on the Smalltalk product set in direct
correlation to the industry focus on that market - i.e. customer demand will
drive the tool investment going forward. Jim quoted the Software Productivity
Group's recent estimates that the Smalltalk market is currently 10.1% of the OO
software development industry, with projections of 10% growth per year for the
next two years. They similarly estimate Java's presence as 21% today, with an
127% increase projected. Jim stated that these types of numbers will be
reflected in the company's on-going investment.
Jim quoted a number of issues that make Smalltalk-related products the tool
of choice today through mid-1998 for projects building commercial three-tier
applications today, including the lack of good team development tools, visual
programming, and database drivers. He also sees a lack of people skills in the
industry. The company plans to provide a mixture of training, consulting, and
products to service its customers that have been and continue to build OO
software assets.
ParcPlace/ObjectShare's product plans for the near future include
Distributed Smalltalk tools to generate Java skeleton code, extensions to Oracle
8.0 connectivity, and GUI enhancements to VisualWorks. Their
site will have quarterly updates as they
roll out new offerings.
GemStoneGemStone's background was initially focussed on the Smalltalk
language. They then released C++-related products and have recently released
Java-related products. As is usually the case, they were strongest at their
initial focus, i.e. Smalltalk. Their site
contains information about all of their products. They did not return requests
for an interview for this piece.
Conclusions Rather than ask the vendors "is Smalltalk dead?",
perhaps you should ask yourself what the future of Smalltalk is. We
received various commitments, from strong to weak, for the support Smalltalk as
a language will receive going forward. It is a fair assumption that, as a
minimum, Smalltalk will retain a niche market in the industry - i.e. it is not
going away. It is also a fair assumption that the market demand for Smalltalk
versus other language options will largely drive the amount of investment by the
Smalltalk vendors. After all, they are in business to make money. You get to
vote with your pocketbook.
Check out
http://www.ifi.ntnu.no/~runarj/smalltalk/products/products.html
for a table listing the various Smalltalk products available on the marketplace,
as well as hotlinks to their respective sites. |
| The alignment of companies in the continuing clash of the software industry
titans shifted as a result of the agreement reached by Microsoft and Apple. Why
would Microsoft invest in an ailing company? Bill Gates wants to continue to
dominate the client desktop. He therefore fights industry initiatives like NCs
and Java OSs. These are most often supported by Sun, Oracle, and other
companies that are interested in a more open software world.
So, what does it all mean? Here's one perspective ( Source:
Time magazine, August 18, 1997, pp. 11. ):
- Microsoft's browser is now destined for every Mac and Windows PC, so what
is Netscape's future?
- Gate's $150M investment is cheap indeed if it helps with future antitrust
litigation.
|
