Microsoft BizTalk Server 2016 CTP 1 is now available

The release of Microsoft BizTalk Server 2016 is the buzz since last year after Microsoft has shown off its integration roadmap for server integration and cloud products. On 30th March 2016, Microsoft has finally released its BizTalk Server 2016 CTP. The BizTalk Server is used widely by the organization who wanted to do business to business integration, Enterprise Application Integration (EAI) and building loosely coupled interfaces.

The new improved features offered with this latest release of BizTalk Server 2016 CTP 1 are:

• A High Availability support for both Azure IaaS workloads and on-premises by the SQL Server AlwaysOn Availability Groups 
• Support for SHA-2 hash function 
• Offers platform alignment support with the latest versions of Office 2016, Windows Server 2016, Visual Studio 2015 and SQL Server 2016 
• BizTalk Server can now run on Azure IaaS Virtual Machines with the production support 
• The scenarios of Ordered Delivery messaging is improved 
• Facilitated Accelerator and Adapter updated for WCF relay bindings, SAP and SFTP and also Accelerators for HL7 

The previous version of Microsoft BizTalk Server featuring the Windows Clustering and Microsoft Distributed Transaction Coordinator (MSDTC) which created difficulty in achieving High Availability in the cloud. The newer version of BizTalk Server features AlwaysOn Availability Groups that allow the customers to move their production interfaces to the cloud.

Microsoft has also updated its BizTalk Administration Console. It’s one of the changes is to configure the core BizTalk Hosts/Host Instances within the environment. Also, administrators can now do performance settings across multiple hosts consistently. Contact Biztalk Development Company for consulting, development and maintenance of Microsoft BizTalk applications.

Rogue Wave Software released Zend Server 9 that supports PHP 7

Developers and administrators can now take advantage and learn PHP 7 quickly by using the Zend Server 9. Rogue Wave Software has released its Zend Server 9, which is a new version of PHP server released with new debugging proficiencies. This version has improved the overall performance and speed for the language.

Zeev Suraski, CTO of Rogue Wave and co-founder of Zend, said, “As Web environments are moving to PHP 7, we’re seeing more and more evidence that the promise of 2x performance is being realized, big time. To be honest, I can’t recall anything similar in the software space. Being able to halve your hardware after a mostly painless software upgrade; I don’t remember anything quite like that ever.”

Also included in Zend Server 9 is a gallery of community-driven plug-ins for extending the platform. Jobs can also be queued and cached for optimization while the servers themselves can be clustered for high availability.

A quick glance on Zend Server 9 features:

• Offers support for PHP 7 
• Tracing code is redesigned cleanly and its modern UI is built in HTML5 technology 
• View full page with Z-Rays’s that facilitates easier and quicker view and analysis of data. 
• Z-Ray Live and Z-Ray History offers full support for CLI processes 
• Web API’s reduce code tracing and information retrieval time from the back-end 
• Z-Ray history tracks PHP development and installation requests made in the past 
• Configuration of code tracing options is now streamlined 
• New access controls for easy, simple and hassle-free setup in development and secure configuration in production 

The Zend Server 9 is released in two versions: Enterprise and Standard. The Professional Edition cost US$20 per month. The package also includes debugging support for developers. On the other hand, Enterprise Edition cost $80 user/month and contains debugging support for production. The Zend Server 9 also supports IIS Web Servers, Apache and NGINX. It is also available as a Windows binary, Mac OS X package, and a Linus package.

The Zend Server 9 is also available in Plus version which offers extensive support and also support for open-source tools. Both editions facilitate tracing and debugging capabilities. TatvaSoft has a team of PHP experts who have been doing architectural design using the Zend framework. Since 2007, our PHP developers have delivered hundreds of projects of robust and scalable applications.

Google launched a new release of Android Studio 2.2 Preview

Google launched its Android Studio 2.2 version with a bunch of improvements that are designed to enhance the application for development. According to Google, the new Android Studio version will have their emulators run faster on the device app. To make the developer experience easier is critical, however, Google provides faster build, test code and recording feature to run them locally or via. cloud test lab to enhance user experience.

A sneak peak of some of its new features:

• New Layout: A new layout design is loaded with more features that makes easier for the developer to enhance their app development feature. With the new user interface, the designers can easily move the widgets by simply drag and drop action to the design surface or component tree mode. Also, the user can identify the spacing in the layout, edit system preference files and edit menu with UI builder and quick widget using the properties panel.
• Constraint Layout: User can create dynamic user interfaces without nesting them in the multiple layouts. A constraint layout can be created using the built-in templates in the New Project Wizard. User may also create a Constraint layout by clicking on any layout in the new Layout Edition and then select Convert to Constraint Layout option.
• Layout Inspector: This new version captures the snapshot of the app that will help the user in identifying the bug. User can analyze each component of the UI by accessing the hierarchy of the app. The user can capture the current view hierarchy screenshot of your app for inspection, which is particularly useful when trying to track down a bug.
• Emulator Speed: Developers will experience their emulators working three times faster than the older version of Android Studio 2.1.
• Build Speed: Developer will benefit with an improved speed of the build in the new version.
• Automated Test Recording: A new feature to excite the developers is the new automated test recording feature. Developers will be able to record their action with a single click and start using the app. With each action performed, the app turns into the Expresso Code, which can be played on different platforms. This Test Recording feature reduces development time to the tenth of what it seemed to be in the earlier version.
• Firebase Plugin: Firebase plugin can be added to the new or existing Android app by using the Assistance Windows. The Firebase features can be accessed from the IDE. 
• Samples Browser: This menu options give the access to the sample codes. For this, user requires to highlight the Variables, Methods or Types in the code by right clicking and select Find Sample Code to get the results.
• APK Analyzer: It helps the user to reduce the size of the APK by analyzing the ProGuard configuration problems, view merged AndroidManifest.xml file, reduces the issues in Dex files by avoiding 64k referenced method and examine the compiled resource file.
• Support: Includes Android N support for developers.

The new version of Android Studio 2.2 is designed to improve the developers and users experience. Android devices are popular worldwide and used by millions of people. Learn more about Android App Development Services.

Microsoft released new Windows 10 Preview for PC’s with more enhanced features

Microsoft has announced a few cosmetic updates for the new Windows 10 preview. This preview is built for the people participating in the Windows Insider Program. The major update includes changing the way how Microsoft Edge Internet Browser extension work, including few bug and interface fixes.

Gabe Aul, corporate vice president of Microsoft’s Engineering Systems Team wrote in a blog that “This change means that your currently installed extensions will be removed, and you’ll have to reinstall the ones you want from the Store. Then in future updates, your extensions will be automatically re-downloaded and installed.” This facilitates user with automatic download of all available extensions directly from the Windows Store instead of extracting and loading extensions from a local folder.

Microsoft extensions that are included in this build are, Pinterest’s Pin It button, Adblock, Adblock Plus, Mouse Gestures, Microsoft’s OneNote Web Clipper, Microsoft Translator and Reddit Enhancement Suite. The user can also go back to the previous page in Edge.

Another feature includes the new real-time web notifications. This will allow all participating websites to send notifications via.Action Centre to the user after receiving their permission. Aul further wrote “For example, when your friend sends you a message on Skype for Web while you’re busy in the Xbox app, you won’t miss a thing. A notification from the website will appear in Windows, just like an app might send. Click on the notification and you’ll be right back in Microsoft Edge at the site that sent it!”

Skype now features new dark themes that allow user to switch between different accounts in the app. This also allows user to give permission to the Windows to make changes on their PC. Another major noticeable change includes “GitHub Desktop app for Windows will now have a dark theme option. Additionally, users will get a new App settings option where they can allow the websites to open a desktop app.

Talking about Windows 10 WiFi Sense features, users are now not allowed to share their WiFi networks with their contact or automatically connect with the shared WiFi networks from their contact. Aul wrote “The cost of updating the code to keep this feature working combined with low usage and low demand made this not worth further investment. Wi-Fi Sense, if enabled, will continue to get you connected to open Wi-Fi hotspots that it knows about through crowdsourcing.”

The users who are already part of the Windows Insider Program can get this latest update through the Windows Update feature. For others, upgrading is free of cost until July 19, after which cost for updating will be $119.

Microsoft Research can (almost) read your mind!

In this highly demanding technological era, mobile devices have created a new way of interaction. Being a smart touch phone, interaction has become easier than before by using the capacitive touchscreen. However, Google and Apple have been trying since last few years to treat the fingers differently respective to the context. A new research by Microsoft has fixed its “one tap, one touch” paradigm.

Microsoft has implemented Google’s precognition of Force Touch’s pressure sensitivity where the mobile device can itself predict where the user’s finger is about to touch the screen. The fundamentals implemented on the new touchscreen is based on sensing an electrical disruption caused by two ways when finger approach near to the mobile screen and secondly the pressure detected while holding the edge of the mobile.

Self-capacitance sensor is what’s used in Microsoft prototype which is extremely sensitive towards the finger gestures. The finger touch can be detected before an inch or two away from the screen. This predictive touch feature can now pull up the controls by sensing the touch of how it has been held or be hovering on it. For instance, it can reveal the hyperlinks or pull up the video controls. It can also reduce the multiple actions by combining hover and touch to use the context menus.

The smart predictive touch by Microsoft can easily identify the rapid and precise tap. This means a precise tap will map to the exact button where the user wants to touch. Microsoft has created a demo right now and presented the research at the conference of Human-Computer Interaction (CHI) 2016 that may be used for real mobile devices in the future.

Microsoft SharePoint App is coming to hit competitors in this mobile era

Today’s competitive world demands seamless user experience across all devices. By getting a tough competition from its competitors like Dropbox, Box, and Slack, Microsoft overhauls its SharePoint app for Windows 10, Android and iOS and finally ends the long wait by announcing its major SharePoint Mobile App.

SharePoint has been extensively used by 190 million users worldwide from last 15 years, SharePoint users around the world can now join Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella vision, “cloud first, mobile first” with this app. The SharePoint App for iOS will launch by the end of June whereas Android and Windows 10 users can expect it later in this year.

This App is a result of Microsoft’s team collaboration and is designed to allow the users to use it on the go. User can share the information, search company documents, use corporate intranet and much more. Additionally, Microsoft plans to synchronize SharePoint Online document libraries with the OneDrive mobile apps, along with the facility to copy from OneDrive to SharePoint.

With the launch of Microsoft SharePoint Server 2016 earlier in this year, customers can now access their sites easily from anywhere by using the new smartphone app. A new SharePoint homepage allows viewing the integration information with other Office products.

Microsoft also shares its plan to release its OneDrive Universal Windows App by the end of June. Microsoft is planning to use the placeholders to allow users to easily sync cloud content with the service, thereby save their drive space. Microsoft has announced new updates for SharePoint to make it more compatible with Office 365. Microsoft SharePoint deployment has strengthened the organizations to meet their business requirement.

At TatvaSoft, SharePoint deployments and customizations are done by Microsoft experts. Being a CMMi ML3 and Microsoft Gold Certified Software Development Company, TatvaSoft possesses deep experience in all aspects of using the Microsoft tools for SharePoint development and deployment. Having experience in developing mobile apps on major platforms like Windows, iOS and Android, clients are benefited in accomplishing their business objectives.

Google launched Android Studio 2.1 to support Android N development

Google has recently launched the latest version, Android Studio 2.1 integrated development environment (IDE). It offers support to build applications for its Android N Developer Preview versions for faster Instant Run and Preview. Earlier, in this year, Google has launched its first Android N Developer Preview followed by another Preview.

The Android Studio 2.1 version is supported by Linux, Mac and Windows. It can be downloaded from Android.com/SDK. The existing users of Android Studio can find this new version in their navigation menu:

Visit Check for Update [Windows/Linux] under Help Menu and Check for Check for Updates on [OS X] under Android Studio.

The developers can now use the Preview SDK latest versions to work on Java, try new Jack Complier and use their hands on the official Android Emulator which also runs N Developer Preview Emulator System Images. Due to the availability of the new Jack compiler, developers can perform operations like compile-time type annotations, lambdas, intersection types, method references on all new versions of Android platform. The Android N version features only repeatable annotations and static methods.

Any change running on an emulator or your device can be easily notified by the Instant Run which streamlines the workflow. Using this, the user can easily identify the changes running “in a near instant”. This will enable the developer to code continuously and run the app. When the Instant Run is used, then it will analyze the changes and identify how a new code can be deployed in the quickest way. Instant Run is compatible with any Android device or an emulator running API 14 or higher version.

With the incremental Java compilation, Instant Run can quickly update incremental changes. Meaning that, a change in a single line of code does not require all Java sources of that module to be recompiled. Also, class files will not be converted to dex files to create dex processes separately. For this feature, user requires increasing Gradle daemon from 1GB to minimum 2GB.

After the launch of Android Studio 2, most of you must be looking for developing android apps using the latest version. For that, TatvaSoft, a CMMi ML 3 Software Development Company, offers Android Apps Development services following its state-of-the-art culture in one of the fastest growing platforms. The team of expert android developers has access to all latest tools to develop, test and deploy the apps to serve with the best results.

What's new in Microsoft SharePoint Server 2016?

Microsoft has released its latest version of SharePoint Server which is a foundational improvement of on-premises SharePoint solutions. It is available for download at Microsoft Volume License Service Center. In addition to the SharePoint Server 2016, a new version of SharePoint is also released and innovations can be seen in Sharepoint Online and OneDrive available for Business.

Sharepoint Server 2016 targeted following three areas:

Cloud-inspired infrastructure
The user can experience a new generation of SharePoint with SharePoint Server 2016 that is brought to a whole new experience to those who is running Office 365. Using SharePoint online improves performance, offers more manageability, scalability and reliability. The SharePoint Server 2016 code is derived from SharePoint Online which has been validated by millions of users worldwide. The code also provides updates and support across on-premises SharePoint server and Office 365.

Compliance and reporting
The SharePoint Server 2016 facilitates confidentiality and data protection by enabling data encryption by investing in DLP and compliance tools that are active on-premises servers. SharePoint Server 2016 offers extensive features and capabilities to ensure the security of sensitive data.

Enhanced user experiences
SharePoint users will get an enhanced user experienced by using Office 365 with improved document libraries and navigation constructs. The hybrid customers will now receive seamless experience from datacenter to the cloud. Also, the user will have an improved mobile access and touch-based experience.

SharePoint Server 2016 is a good investment which benefits with scalability, quality, and reliable Sharepoint experience. SharePoint rich solutions have always been an important asset for the organizations. To meet the opportunities offered by SharePoint Server 2016, TatvaSoft, a CMMi ML 3 and Microsoft Gold Certified company have SharePoint Architects, Software Developers and Technical Consultants that understand every minute detail of the client’s project to deliver robust, secure and streamline SharePoint solutions.

Software Outsourcing History of India

The concept of software outsourcing is not new. People have soon released the concept after its competitive advantage has been documented by Adam Smith in his book named “The Wealth of Nations”. This book describes how a company can benefit with reduced cost of labor with outsourcing companies than by working with the developed countries and pay more. India has become a top destination in serving with software outsourcing services to global clients.

India has been considered by the companies due to multiple reasons, like high-quality IT skills, large number of English speaking population, and all these benefits available at an economical labor cost compared to other countries. Sooner, since the inception of outsourcing services came up, India took up the concept and made efforts to attract countries in investing and work with Indian software outsourcing companies. After the private companies have given the access of telecom services, now talking with international companies incur the low costs that is a major contributing factor to communicate with the clients.

Limitless opportunities in India have gained the attention of foreign countries to consider India for its outsourcing services. Earlier, the outsourced projects were solely related to medical transcription which later includes only customer service, billing, software development, data entry, SEO, creative, and many others. Even parent companies have started establishing their sister companies or setting up the dedicated development center in India.

As several companies have already setup in India, therefore these international companies find outsourcing services more cost beneficial. This helps the companies in preventing investing money in labor cost, instead, they can now spend more on their company infrastructure, marketing, brand building, implementing systems, and many more. To have a continuous monitor of actions in sister companies, these parent companies assign their member to control the operations and visit there at regular intervals to gain their insight.

Summary:
Cost and better outcomes are the most common reason why the companies prefer to outsource their projects to India. Outsourcing has gone through major changes and the Indian companies have now focused more on latest technologies, well-trained professionals and world class services.

Microsoft’s Latest SQL Server 2016 to Hit Market in June

For all the technical geeks, here is a news from Microsoft. Next month on June 1, 2016, Microsoft will release the latest version SQL Server 2016.

The latest version of Microsoft SQL Server 2016 is packed with significant features which are not available in its earlier versions. Microsoft is to release the business analytics and end-to-end data management solution meeting critical intelligence that will gain insights of data on any device applicable for the demanding applications.

SQL Server 2016 edition will be available in Enterprise, Standard Express, and Developer database management suite. The Developer edition is available for free to download. It is packed with features similar to Enterprise, however, it is designed for development and testing and therefore cannot experience production workloads. Microsoft is offering this edition with a free lifetime license and also have a Microsoft Software Assurance contract and offer free support to the Oracle users who switch to it before the end of the next month.

Comprehensive Features of SQL Server 2016

SQL Server 2016 is ideal for:

• Enterprise Scale Data Warehousing encapsulating in-memory columnstore which improves the query performance by 100x than disk based solutions. This offers accessibility to optimized MPP scale out software which can be combined with the scale out appliance architecture with Analytics Platform System (APS).
• Mission Critical Intelligent Applications delivered operational intelligence in real time by combining in-memory technology and built-in advanced analytics without affecting data and user performance.
• Intensive Business Intelligence Solutions are built up for mobile phones to deliver end-to-end mobile BI solution which can deliver insight on any mobile device. Additionally, users can user the modern web portal to manage the traditional reports, KPIs, and mobile reports.
• Always Encrypted Technology availability to ensure maximum security, which renders data protection to rest or active data without hampering the performance of the database.
• New big data solutions allow to query both the structured and unstructured data easily with T-SQL by combining relational and non-relational data using PolyBase technology built-in.
• A new Stretch Database Technology is introduced as Hybrid cloud solutions which lower the storage cost, streamline IT operations and increase high availability. This gives easy accessibility to the user of their historical data by security stretching the OLTP data to Microsoft Azure.

Microsoft SQL Server for Linux will be made available by 2017. The new edition of SQL Server 2016 is loaded with several extensive features by Microsoft. Upgrading or migration to new platform possesses complexity and demands effort. The post-migration environment will be fully optimized with the intuitive features. TatvaSoft, being a CMMi ML 3 and Microsoft Gold Certified Software Development Company possess the architectural knowledge and proven expertise for data migrations for mid to large size enterprise.

Popular Java EE Servers of 2016

Here is a data collected from JVMs Plumbr Agents showing the statistic of the most widely used Java EE servers.

Java has set the global standard for developing website application, desktop application, mobile application, games and enterprise software. Java ensures developer to develop and deploy exciting applications. Java EE containers have been widely used, therefore, it is important to know which Java EE containers have hit the market in 2015.

Java EE Containers Statistics of 2015

This data is collected from 1,240 deployments where the container vendors were identified in around 70% of the environment or on 862 occasions.

The statistics of Java EE Containers vendors are as follows:

1. Tomcat – Tomcat hits its peers with a 58.22% market share, succeeded its base with 50% threshold.
2. JBoss / WildFly – Securing the second position, JBoss/WildFly hits 20.22% of the market share.
3. Jetty – Jetty securing a little less of 10.67% market share, gains the third position.
4. Glassfish – Its installations contribute 5.56% of market share.
5. Oracle Weblogic – Incur installations of 2.44% with deployment.
6. Other – This category staged the name with the installation of less than 2.5%. The list named SAP NetWeaver, Resis, Orion, IBM WebSphere deployment and OC4J, all experienced less than five deployments.

The JVMs have not reported Java EE container were mostly like: 

• Containerless server software like TIBCO, Elasticsearch etc.
• Desktop applications using AWT or Swing
• Dynamic language runtimes like Scala or Groovy
• Hidden into development environment launchers like Maven, Eclipse sbt, IDEA, etc
• Making use of Netty like Play Framework

It is challenging to interpret the market changes over the period of time. To transform the challenges into deployments, TatvaSoft, a CMMI ML3 software development company offers exceptional Java development services to meet the business expectation using its Java experience J2SE, J2EE, J2ME and JavaFX to develop web and mobile applications with the industry specific solution impeccably. TatvaSoft’s expert pool of java professionals with excellent delivery record ensures meeting client's compliance requirements.

Enhance Business Success from Software Outsourcing Services

Every company who successfully outsource their software development projects experience profits with their outsourcing business partners. Today, a huge demand and wider availability of the Software Outsourcing services have gained worldwide business attention where the companies are now outsourcing their projects. Several companies are also considering their business benefits after involving the outsourcing services which have increased their productivity and improved work quality.

Every software development company provide their specific services that meet an individual company requirements. It is not necessary that every outsourcing company can meet their client’s business objectives. Therefore, before hiring any outsourcing services, it is important to first define the business requirement. Also, remember, that a software outsourcing companies cannot deliver a finished project based on the requirement. Hence, make sure to keep your requirement transparent with the service provider.

A wonderful way is to first perform a feasibility testing to check if there is any possibility to practically fulfill the business requirement as desired. If the answer comes in “Yes”, then the software outsourcing company will continue with the development process where they will decide which technology is to be used to develop the project and what will be the expected result in terms of look, functionality, and feel. If the client is confident with the expected result, then the project will be divided into small chunks called milestones which are assigned to each developer to start working on the project.

Conclusion:

Software Outsourcing has gained high popularity worldwide to fulfill the demand of the software development. Nowadays, almost every business prefers to outsource their projects to concentrate on their business core objectives and make a better decision. The cost of the outsourcing service will totally depend on the project requirements.