FrontPage Server Extensions Comes to iSeries Linux

by Alex Woodie

iSeries shops that want to let users update their Apache Web sites using Microsoft's FrontPage Web authoring software can now do so using free software recently made available by Ready-to-Run Software. In accordance with a contract with IBM, Ready-to-Run in late December made the Microsoft FrontPage 2002 Server Extensions available for iSeries, pSeries, and zSeries boxes running Novell's SuSE Linux 8.0 and the Apache Web server, providing FrontPage authors an alternative to Microsoft's own IIS Web Server.

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Since Microsoft launched its FrontPage Web authoring software, about six years ago, it has relied on Ready-to-Run to make FrontPage Server Extensions available on other platforms, particularly Unix servers, says Bill Saltys, vice president of sales and marketing with the Chelmsford, Massachusetts, software and services company. "It's a way to migrate all of your [Web site] data set to Apache," he says. "Once you have the extensions installed, there's no need to have IIS running in the corner."

It may surprise you that Microsoft lets its FrontPage Web authoring software update Web sites that use neither the Windows operating system nor the Microsoft Internet Information Services (IIS) Web server. Considering the fierce legal battles the Redmond, Washington, company has fought in defense of its aggressive software bundling practices, as well as its reputation for attempting to squelch rival technologies using its monopoly on the desktop, it almost sounds like a different company.

However, providing cross-platform support through FrontPage Server Extensions does ensure Microsoft the widest possible audience for FrontPage, which is the premiere and dominant Web authoring tool on the market, with an estimated 80 percent share of the market, according to Saltys. By comparison, Microsoft IIS Server is currently the second-most used HTTP server, and has about a 21-percent share of the Web server market, which is down from a high of about 35 percent in the spring of 2002, according to Netcraft's Web server survey. The Apache Web server has dominated the World Wide Web since the spring of 1996, and today more than 70 percent of the world's Web servers use the open-source HTTP server.

Internet service providers are the most frequent users of the FrontPage Server Extensions, Saltys says, but companies of all shapes and sizes request the software from their systems vendors. IBM formed a partnership with Ready-to-Run to provide the FrontPage Server Extensions on its eServer platforms as a way to protect its revenue, he says. Customers who rely on an eServer to run manufacturing software could use the lack of FrontPage support on their IBM hardware as a reason to invite another system vendor, such as Hewlett-Packard, to the table for discussion, he says.

Providing iSeries Linux support for the FrontPage Server Extensions was the priority in Ready-to-Run's latest contract with IBM, Saltys says. "I wouldn't say there's a large demand, but there are definitely users today asking for it," he says. "That's the primary reason it was done: There were iSeries customer demanding it."

IBM paid Ready-to-Run an undisclosed fee to port FrontPage Server Extensions to iSeries, pSeries, and zSeries servers running SuSE Linux Enterprise Server 8. Ready-to-Run, which specializes in application migration, charges users nothing to download and use FrontPage Server Extensions. (It only asks users to fill out their contact information and to agree to Microsoft's end user licensing agreement). IBM eServer users can download the software from Ready-to-Run's Web site, at www.rtr.com.