I'm in Cincinnati this week, working with the ObjectStudio 8 team. Our plan is to release it in beta form this winter, with a fully supported release coming in the summer (possibly winter - that decision is still up in the air). We are working with one early adopter now, and are in the process of adding additional pre-beta sites. If you're interested, contact me.

What is OS8, you ask? ObjectStudio used to be called Enfin, and has been around for quite awhile. It's a Windows specific Smalltalk system, which excels at building client/server applications. We've been adding integration with VisualWorks for awhile now, and OS8 is a big move in that direction. Using VW namespaces, we are hosting ObjectStudio inside VisualWorks. We are maintaining the OS library behavior, even as we move into the VW environment.

What's cool about this? Well, OS users get a much faster VM, and immediate access to all the VW libraries they've been hankering for: WS*, Web Toolkit, Cryptography - the whole nine yards. Meanwhile, VW developers get native Windows integration - native GUIs and embedded ActiveX controls. It's great stuff for everyone, and we're pretty excited about it.

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