Innovative Tools Deliver Strong Support For Microsoft Dynamic HTML and Channel Definition Format

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REDMOND, Wash., June 24, 1997 — Microsoft Corp. today announced the availability of third-party tools that make it easier for developers to use the Dynamic HTML and channel definition format (CDF) technologies in Microsoft® Internet Explorer 4.0. With the immediate availability of third-party tools, designers can begin creating fast, interactive pages and personalized “push” content today.

Tool vendors announcing or demonstrating their support for these standards-based technologies include Allaire Corp., Bluestone Inc., Elemental Software Inc., ExperTelligence Inc., Pictorius Inc. and SoftQuad Inc. Several vendors demonstrated tools to more than 200 attendees at the Microsoft Internet Explorer Reviewers Workshop, being held in Redmond today and tomorrow.

“SoftQuad is pleased to have incorporated support for dynamic HTML into our upcoming release of HoTMetaL PRO 4.0,” said Lauren Wood, technical product manager for SoftQuad and chair of the W3C Document Object Model Working Group. “SoftQuad is a believer in standards-based technologies, and we support the Document Object Model as an enabling technology for the development and delivery of structured documents across the Web and corporate intranets.”

“The industry support demonstrated today marks a critical milestone for our customers because all of the pieces are now in place to develop sites using Dynamic HTML and CDF,” said Cornelius Willis, director of platform marketing at Microsoft. “Developers and designers who want to stay ahead of the curve should start developing their sites right now using these technologies.”

Dynamic HTML Support Enables Easier Creation of Faster Interactive Web Pages

Companies demonstrating Dynamic HTML tools today include the following:

In addition, Allaire and Elemental Software announced that they will incorporate support for Microsoft Dynamic HTML in future versions of their products. These companies join Borland International Inc., Macromedia Inc. and the Powersoft division of Sybase Inc., which already have announced their intent to support Dynamic HTML. Microsoft plans to support Dynamic HTML in the next version of the Microsoft FrontPage® Web authoring and management tool by the end of this year, as well as in the next version of the Microsoft Visual InterDev
™
Web development system.

“Our customers want to create fast and useful Web-based enterprise business applications, and Microsoft Dynamic HTML adds tremendous value,” said Mel Balada, president of Bluestone Software. “Bluestone Sapphire/Web’s support for Dynamic HTML data binding makes it easier than ever to build mission-critical applications such as financial reporting and data entry for corporate developers.”

Dynamic HTML lets authors control every element of a Web page and change the page’s content and style at any time, even after the page has loaded, without refreshing the page. Data-binding capabilities enable developers to create Web applications that asynchronously display and manipulate business data on the fly. Authors can add these features to their Web pages using a combination of scripting and standard HTML. The Web tools announced today make such scripting easier, with intelligent, visual scripting features and support for the Document Object Model and data binding.

Microsoft Dynamic HTML and World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) Standards

Microsoft Dynamic HTML is fully compatible with standards-based technologies to help ensure the broadest level of interoperability with third-party products. Dynamic HTML provides the only implementation of the Document Object Model that supports the features listed in the W3C preliminary requirements for the Document Object Model. (See (http://www.w3.org/MarkUp/DOM/drafts/requirements.html) and http://msdn.microsoft.com/workshop/author/dhtml/omcc-f.htm .

Dynamic HTML also supports the World Wide Web Consortium HTML 3.2 and Cascading Style Sheets 1.0 Recommendations, and the Cascading Style Sheets Positioning and HTML “Cougar” working drafts. Authors can write to Dynamic HTML using JavaScript and the Visual Basic® programming system, Scripting Edition, and can extend Dynamic HTML using Java
™
Applets and ActiveX
™
Controls.

Tools Help Authors Build CDF Files Quickly and Easily

Companies demonstrating channel definition format tools today include the following:

  • Allaire. The final release of Cold Fusion 3.0 will be available by the end of June on the Allaire Web site (http://www.allaire.com/) . Allaire also announced that it plans to support CDF in the next version of its Home Site product.

  • Pictorius. The final release of iNet Developer 2.0 will be available by the end of June on the Pictorius Web site (http://www.pictorius.com/) .

In addition to these companies and products, tool vendors announcing support for CDF include Bluestone, Elemental Software, ExperTelligence and SoftQuad. Microsoft plans to support CDF in the next version of Microsoft FrontPage by the end of this year, as well as in the next version of Microsoft Visual InterDev.

Tools supporting CDF will help content providers easily generate CDF files for their Web sites, with no knowledge or authoring of extensible markup language (XML) required. In addition, this support will enable the creation of custom CDF files for individual end users, so they can specify what pages they want to see and how often these pages should be delivered to their desktops.

“Dynamic HTML and CDF provide Web developers with the unparalleled ability to personalize content delivery and add interactivity to Web-based applications,” said Jeremy Allaire, co-founder and director of technology strategy at Allaire Corp. “Cold Fusion’s support for these standards-based technologies allows Web developers to easily add Dynamic HTML to their Web-based applications and, through its leading database integration, Cold Fusion enables the creation of CDF content on the fly.”

Implementing CDF lets any Web author deliver timely, personalized content to millions of users worldwide on a regular basis. The CDF file provides a description of what’s on the site while providing mechanisms for grouping information logically, scheduling how often the content is to be updated, and determining how best to deliver content to the user. Because CDF is an open format, any information provider can develop content to take advantage of CDF, any server can run CDF-enhanced Web sites, and any broadcast-enabled client software can access Web channels using CDF.

CDF, an application of the XML work-in-progress at the W3C, can be implemented without writing Java, JavaScript or Livescript code. Microsoft proposed CDF to the W3C in March, and CDF is supported by nearly 40 of the industry’s leading content providers, Web and Java authoring tools vendors, and push developers.

Availability

Dynamic HTML is available today in the Microsoft Internet Explorer 4.0 Platform Preview release. It will be featured in all versions of Microsoft Internet Explorer 4.0 and will be a freely redistributable component that third parties can incorporate in their applications. CDF will be supported in the next release of Microsoft Internet Explorer 4.0.

Founded in 1975, Microsoft (NASDAQ
“MSFT”
) is the worldwide leader in software for personal computers. The company offers a wide range of products and services for business and personal use, each designed with the mission of making it easier and more enjoyable for people to take advantage of the full power of personal computing every day.

Microsoft, FrontPage, Visual InterDev, Visual Basic and ActiveX are either registered trademarks or trademarks of Microsoft Corp. in the United States and/or other countries.

Java is a trademark of Sun Microsystems Inc.

Other product and company names herein may be trademarks of their respective owners.

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