2003
The Chhiri project progressed as planned and in May the migration work and the RAD tools were completed. In the mean time the hype around web services had led to discussions in the software industry, highlighting the benefits of Service Oriented Architectures (SOA) when it comes to ease of integration and application extension.
This, combined with a desire from IFS to provide easier-to-use and well documented interfaces for partners and customers alike, led to the decision to incorporate the architecture (which was service oriented), techniques and tools originating from the Ti22 project (and now moved to J2EE by the Chhiri project) into the core Foundation1 architecture. In practice this meant splitting the business logic tier into two sub tiers - one application core tier containing the existing business logic, and one services layer, where service-oriented interfaces to the business logic are placed. This change not only allowed restructuring, consolidation, and simplification of the entire Foundation1 platform - it also created the architecture platform on which IFS could initiate key development investments for the coming years.
The extension of the architecture with a services layer, and the incorporation of a new RAD tool for that layer, was such a big step forward that it deserved giving the architecture a new name. And so the Open Layered Architecture (OLA) from 1995 was now officially superseded by IFS Service Oriented Component Architecture (SOCA).
The Handshake project working on a platform for mobile clients continued throughout the year. The framework itself, as well as the mobile applications, were developed completely according to the SOCA architecture. In October the first beta release was ready.
Following IFS principle of continuously updating and replacing technologies, 2003 also became the year when one of the oldest parts of Foundation1 would see its first big overhaul. Under the umbrella of the "Bayonet" project a new architecture for operational reporting was developed. Existing reports would be complemented to produce XML data.
A new WYSIWYG report layout tool - IFS Report Designer - was developed.
The new solution was based entirely on open standards, where IFS Report Designer created an XML style sheet that would transform the XML report data into a XSL/FO (Formatting Object) file, which was then rendered into PDF for viewing/printing. As all new development of Foundation1, the new solution was built according to SOCA and made good use of the services layer.
In the second half of the year a lot of work went into consolidating Foundation1 in order to lower the cost of deploying and operating Foundation1 based applications. Things like installation, configuration, authentication, were homogenized throughout the different parts of the platform, and bits were "merged" to reduce the number of parts in the platform. Combined with the move to a standard J2EE middleware this resulted in a Foundation1 platform that was significantly easier to understand, install, and operate.
In November Foundation1 2004 was released together with IFS Applications 2004. The entire web and middle tiers were now fully on the J2EE architecture, with support for all leading application servers. The consolidation meant that there was now a single component where all runtime and development tools for the services layer of SOCA were collected - "Extended Server". The "original" Foundation1 component with runtime, tools, and services for the application core was renamed "IFS Base Server". All the new parts (services, mobile clients, XML reports) now used the common RAD environment created by the Chhiri project. Because of it's central part in current and future versions of Foundation1 this environment was given the ambitious name of "IFS Developer Studio".
