WRQ Adds Web-Services Support

WRQ Inc., which sells software for integrating mainframe components with newer IT systems, is adding support for emerging Web-services technology within its latest toolset. On Monday, WRQ will make available through its Web site an add-on component for Verastream Host Integrator 4.5 and Verastream Integration Broker 9.0. The add-on is free to Verastream customers.

Host Integrator, which starts at $60,000, lets developers abstract and encapsulate pieces of business logic from mainframe and legacy systems and expose the components as Component Object Model or Corba objects or through a Java application programming interface, all common technologies within modern IT systems. A developer can also register the components within Integration Broker and use the tool, which starts at $64,000, to build a business process by connecting the various application pieces. Verastream customers include the Minnesota Department of Public Safety, Driver and Vehicle Services Division.

The add-on includes an open-source Apache access server that can take Simple Object Access Protocol requests from Web applications and perform the translation necessary to pass on the request to a mainframe or legacy component exposed as a Java API. Soap, one of three core technologies used in emerging Web-services architectures, is the communication protocol based on XML for connecting applications. The WRQ add-on would be useful in connecting modern company portal software to legacy systems, company officials said.