Aligo, Inc.
444 De Haro Street, Suite 211
San Francisco, CA 94107
Web: www.aligo.com
Phone: 415 593-8200
Fax: 415 553-8896
E-mail: info@aligo.com
Test Environment
Dell 1400 PowerEdge 1 CPU (795MHz), Windows 2000 Server SP1 256MB RAM
Specifications
Platforms: Windows NT/2000, various Unix
Pricing: Contact Aligo for pricing
As an industry we used to consider mobile/wireless computing to be the next frontier. Now it has become part and parcel of critical, enterprise applications ranging from Customer Resource Management to Enterprise Resource Planning. Many of the early mobile computing efforts that I've run across were built around external application service providers (ASPs) and relied on gateway technology. From an investment perspective it made perfect sense to approach the problem in this manner.
First-stage projects in new markets (such as mobile computing) often rely on "one-off" technology stacks. How-ever, we've reached the stage where mobile computing projects should be integrated into the organization's core infrastructure. Aligo has taken this integrated approach with its M-1 Server. I recently had the opportunity to sit down with the team at Aligo and get my hands on the latest version of their software.
Aligo's Vision for Mobile Computing
Aligo's core proposition is that mobile applications must be tightly integrated with the organization's preexisting enterprise infrastructure and allow an enterprise to leverage its investment in Java resources, including developers, software, tools, and methodology. The idea is to avoid creating new mobile technology "islands" that are isolated from the mainstream of development. The Aligo approach is built around 100% J2EE technology; their product, the M-1 Server, adds mobile/wireless capabilities to any J2EE application ser-ver. While mobile applications have some unique operating characteristics, they will almost always be integrated into an organization's enterprise applications. For example, if you want to build a mobile PDA-based time card application for your mobile field force, most likely you'll integrate the time card data back into your current CRM or HR application. Adding a wireless layer to your enterprise applications presents some unique challenges:
Aligo's M-1 Server addresses many of these challenges by providing a Java-based solution that can be deployed against your favorite application server, such as BEA's WebLogic, Oracle9iAS, and IBM's WebSphere. It also simplifies development by allowing applications written once in Java to be accessible on multiple types of mobile devices without requiring a Java Virtual Machine (JVM). The M-1 Server offers a suite of components that addresses the unique requirements of mobile applications.
- Mobile devices use different mark-up languages and provide a different array of operating capabilities (screen size, memory, etc.).
- The wireless network may require intermittent connectivity and often has a higher latency and lower bandwidth.
- Wireless applications offer new messaging channels (such as SMS).
- Transaction integrity into back-end enterprise databases and applications can be more complex (due to broken connections from the wireless device).
