Object-Oriented Middleware
The Tool	Features and Claims	The Buzz	The Cost
Borland VisiBroker 6	This CORBA 2.6–compliant tool is fully backward compatible with older ORBs. Offers HTTP-to-IIOP request, RMI-over-IIOP and IDL-to-Java translation. Executes on 7 different OSes, and includes VisiNotify (multiple complex message–channel support) and Visi-Transact (multithreaded ORB support with connection management, load balancing and database pooling).	Acquired when Borland was attempting to reinvent itself as an enterprise object company, VisiBroker seems to be receiving less attention these days than the other products in the Borland family. Still, this solution is mature, stable and in use for large, mission-critical industry segments such as finance and telecommunications.	Development license is $2,500 per node; deployment license, $2,500 per CPU.
Iona Orbix 6.1	Offers native .NET access to CORBA systems, Single Sign-on security, a managementarchitecture for improved enterprise collaboration, and high availability, scalability and notification. Includes bidirectional GIOP, native IBM Tivoli integration, full support on 8 OS platforms and a 5-year support plan.	Iona’s Adaptive Runtime Technology (ART) is an impressive, flexible innovation; it takes a microkernel approach to middleware. Since its inception, Iona has also been an ardent OMG supporter and standards promoter, and is active in the submission of new OMG RFPs.	Development kits cost $5,000 per seat; runtime costs range from $10,000–$20,000 per CPU.
JacORB 2.2	You get asynchronous method invocations, an extensible transport framework, the OMG Notification and Event service, the CORBA 2.3 code set and HTTP tunneling support, interface repository and IDL and Java source for all CORBA/COSS interfaces.	Billed as the “free Java implementation of the OMG’s CORBA standard.” Useful for benchmarking standards-compliance from commercial vendors, but consequently lacks commercial extensions such as the monitoring and security capabilities that are so critical in the enterprise.	Free/Open source
Orbacus 4.2	CORBA 3.0 compliant, IPv6 support, C++ and JDK compiler support on 10 OS platforms, active developer community support.	Iona’s low-cost alternative to the many free, open-source OMG standard-compliant CORBA ORBs. Designed primarily for developers geared toward CORBA services, with the ability to painlessly upsize to the Orbix platform as business needs justify the investment.	Developer editions start at $99.
OrBit2	This CORBA 2.4–compliant ORB features C, C++, Lisp, Pascal, Perl, Python, Ruby and TCL, and supports POA, DII, DSI, TypeCode, Any, IR and IIOP.	While slightly behind the latest standards curve, this C-based ORB nonetheless provides open source adherents numerous bindings to popular programming and scripting languages. Useful for highly diverse Unix-oriented computing environments.	Free/Open source
PrismTech OpenFusion TAO and JacORB CORBA Enterprise ORBs	TAO is CORBA 2.6 compliant and supports a variety of threading models, pluggable protocols (including IIOP, UIOP, SHMIOP, SSLIOP, DIOP), interface and implementation repositories, real-time CORBA and CORBA messaging. Includes full source code.	PrismTech’s offerings are commercial-grade variants of open source products such as JacORB. The commercial improvements are substantial and the pricing model varies with the size and complexity of deployments.	Development and runtime licenses are free. Annual support and maintenance cost depends on support level, team size and annual deployments.
Voyager ORB	Offers dynamic aggregation, SOAP and WSDL support, naming services through a single API (including RMI naming and JNDI), universal gateway bridges to non-Voyager protocols, firewall tunneling, and pluggable SSL socket factories with support for PHAOS and RSA toolkits.	The notable differentiator for apps using Recursion’s ORB is its fast development and deployment cycle due to the elimination of the time-consuming, manual chores many traditional ORBs require. Voyager’s best features: mobility, agent technology and ultralight clients.	$500–$1,500 per developer, plus a per-server charge, depending on modules bought. Volume discounts available.
Message-Oriented Middleware
The Tool	Features and Claims	The Buzz	The Cost
ArjunaMS 4.0	This Java-built JMS messaging platform includes a JTA-compliant transaction manager, and an optimized HTTP-based transport with support for SSL encryption and authenticated proxy servers. It uses a server-less transport, multicast and peer-to-peer TCP/IP connections for improved performance and scalability.	Enterprise architects seeking a robust, low-cost license JMS solution should take a closer look at Arjuna’s novel peer-to-peer messaging approach. The company’s remote management API is based on industry-standard JMX and supports JAAS-based user/group security management.	$2,000 per server CPU.
BEA MessageQ	Integrates with BEA Tuxedo and X/Open ATMI compatible apps, BEA WebLogic and Java apps, IBM MQ Series, IBM CICS/ESA and IMS/ESA. Supports both peer-to-peer and client/server messaging, and can service Field Manipulation Language (FML)—enables applications that add metadata to messages to provide context to the message content.	BMQ’s most welcome distinction is the ability to perform name-to-queue address translations at perform name-to-queue address translations at runtime, a capability BEA calls “location independence.” This eliminates app recoding whenever message workflow configurations are changed, while maintaining system and application administrators’ sanity.	Starts at $3,750 per server.
IBM WebSphere MQ	Supports both J2EE and MS.NET environments via the MQ Interface API. JMS 1.1–compliant, can deliver XML and SOAP message, SSL support, and can be deployed on more than 35 platforms.	This Master of MOM, formerly known as MQSeries, helped define the MOM concept over a decade ago. Since then, it has been deployed in more than 10,000 customer installations worldwide. IBM also owns a majority of MOM IP, with more than 120 patents, ensuring its longevity.	Starts at $5,574 (SRP) per processor on distributed platforms.
InteBroker/OSMQ	This tool offers 100% Java 2–compliant, self-monitoring load-balancing that eliminates memory over commitment. You get high-performance FIFO memory queues, IP multi-casting and multicast naming service support.	MQue, the company responsible for the commercial version of InteBroker, has also released an open source version that lacks the GUI-based interface. Mainly targeted at Java developers needing simple JMS queuing systems.	Single commercial license is $795.
MSMQ 2.0	Comes with full COM support and centralized systems management. Interoperates with IBM’s MQSeries and is integrated with Microsoft Transaction Server, Internet Information Server, Cluster Servers and SNA Server.	For enterprises fully committed to the Microsoft computing platform, MSMQ is an obvious choice for a 100% Microsoft-based implementation.	Included with Microsoft NT–based operating systems.
my-Channels Nirvana	J2ME MIDP 1.0/MIDP 2.0/IMP, Personal Java, Win32 (Sun + Microsoft JVM), Linux, Solaris, AIX, Applets (Java Plugin + Microsoft JVM), JavaScript, C++, ActiveX/.NET, SOAP, and Microsoft Excel client support. Also supports TCP sockets, SSL sockets (including client authentication) and HTTP/HTTPS protocols.	While Nirvana doesn’t share the other MOM vendors’ level of market awareness, the product still packs a punch with its server-side scripting and filtering, dynamic configuration management and a rich administration API. The company has 15 customers, including Deutsche Bank’s online Autobahn service.	JMS only: $2,500 per server; Enterprise: $40,000 for 50 topics.
SonicMQ	Offers support for XML, JMS, JNDI, JMX, HTTP, and SOAP, J2EE 1.4 with JMS 1.1 compatibility, immediate failover with real-time replication between active and standby brokers. Dynamic Routing Architecture selects the most effective message path and provides encryption support for HTTPS, SSL, digital certificates, pluggable cipher suites and embedded RSA B-Safe.	Sonic Software has created one of the most popular (and expensive) JMS-compliant messaging platforms, and continues to innovate and successfully position itself in the rapidly expanding SOA marketplace.	Enterprise Edition is $10,000 per CPU per server deployment machine. No charge for clients.