B2B Integration : A Practical Guide to Collaborative E-commerce

Middleware Technologies 241
• Internet Security and Acceleration Server 2000 (ISA) — Contains
two apparently unrelated applications. The first product, Internet
security, is a firewall for setting access policies and network authentication.
The second product, Acceleration server, is a content caching
server.
• Application Center Server 2000 — Provides an administration tool
for managing clusters of COM+ servers, a feature which was
noticeably lacking in DNA.
Microsoft has struggled to penetrate the enterprise distributed
component market, though their latest initiatives, including .NET, could
make them competitive in this space. The fact that they are Microsoft
doesn't hurt either. Though it may take Microsoft some time to capture
a market, they are usually successful at simplifying and demystifying
technologies to the point where they become an out-of-the-box
commodity (usually accomplished by integrating the technology with
the operating system).
COM+
COM and COM+ are the distributed component pieces of the Windows
DNA platform for building distributed application in a Microsoft
Windows environment. Much like CORBA, COM provides a framework
and standards for object and component communication (see Figure 8.8).
Client Application
T
diem Communicates
directly to Object
COM+
Establishes Connection
| Object
Server Application
Figure 8.8. — Basic COM communication process