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Software framework extends capabilities of client server (11/03)

KELLY LOUISEIZE Thunder Bay company fsc Limited has received $400,000 in Industrial Research Assistance Program funding to develop a new software technology product used in conjunction with Microsoft.NET. Microsoft.
KELLY LOUISEIZE

Thunder Bay company fsc Limited has received $400,000 in Industrial Research Assistance Program funding to develop a new software technology product used in conjunction with Microsoft.NET.

Microsoft.NET is a set of software framework used to connect information, people systems and devices through Web services.

Fsc sells enterprise asset management software called 4Site to mining, forestry, or energy plants, George Fleming Jr. says. Usually each company has large assets of investments and the maintenance division oversees those assets. As well, these plants generally have a parts department, stores department, and an accounting department that need to use asset management software to keep track of inventory, outgoing money or assets.

"Our system (4Site) encompasses all of that and some of our customers use the entire system and some use parts of it," Fleming Jr. says.

The new software that he and his colleagues are working on will be a rewrite of the existing 4Site product. The existing system marries with the client-based Windows system and FSC will be developing the new Microsoft.

NET compatible software that can be used in conjunction with Web based server operations.

For example, Grey Planes is a division of Microsoft that has a Web-based application for reporting. When sales people are on the road they can enter their expenses through the Web to this application.

"Dot Net is the framework of technology that will allow you to take advantage of things that the client server does not provide," Fleming Jr. says.

General coding within .NET is called rapid application development tools, which allows far more information to
be transmitted with more efficiency.

"You can create applications that are Web based, which is what a lot of customers think they want at this point."

In addition, the software technology allows for easier inter-connectability to the Internet, wireless devices and third-party software, Fleming Jr. says. When fsc's product comes to market in two and a half years, they will provide a migration for customers who are now with the client server system, while new customers will be able to purchase the asset management software that already marries with .net. In fact, .NET provides client and Web-based applications to be used under its framework.

"Some people says that Web-based software would be used for casual users and client software would be delivered to power users so it is related to how the software will be used."

For instance, buyers in purchasing departments would use client server, whereas a casual user would be someone who would get on the system once a day or a week for a short period.

"It makes sense to deliver Web-based application to those people who use the system infrequently, but deliver client server applications to the power users who use the system all the time."

It is all about processing time, Fleming Jr. says