
                         AppSolutions, Inc.
                   266 Harristown Road, Suite 108
                        Glen Rock, NJ 07452

                         Tel: 201-445-5758
                         Fax: 201-445-5462
                   ==============================


This document contains announcements which may be of interest to our
customers.


Contents
========

 o   New Class(y) Versions 2.4 and 2.5  (August 1, 1994)
        - Class(y) v2.5
        - Performance Enhancements: Technical Overview

 o   AppSolutions Expands Development Team  (August 1, 1994)

 o   New Company Name (December 1993)

 o   ExoSpace (July 1993)



New Class(y) Versions 2.4 and 2.5                     August 1, 1994
=================================

AppSolutions, Inc. is pleased to announce the upcoming release of
Class(y) version 2.4.  Scheduled for release in the third quarter of
1994, Class(y) v2.4 will provide improved performance in a number of
areas.  It will also take better advantage of the increased memory
available in protected mode, while retaining full real-mode
compatibility.

Version 2.4 will be the first stage of a two-stage release.  It will be
followed in the fourth quarter by the release of version 2.5, which will
include additional enhanced features, as well as a library of base
classes. Customers purchasing v2.4 will receive a free upgrade to v2.5
when it becomes available.

This two-stage release is designed to offer Class(y) developers the
opportunity to benefit from increased performance without having to wait
for the completion of other enhanced features.

Performance in Class(y) v2.4 has been improved in two major areas: class
creation and message sending.  Class creation performance has  been
improved dramatically, as described in the technical overview below.

Message sending performance has been improved for class hierarchies
which are two or more levels deep.  The typical class hierarchy ranging
from three to five levels deep will see an improvement in message
sending performance of up to 50%.  Even simple cases of classes which
inherit from Clipper's TBrowse or Get classes will see an improvement of
up to 30%.

Performance optimizations have also been made in a number of other
areas, including handling of the 'super' message and handling of
delegated messages.

Overall, applications using Class(y) should obtain a visible performance
boost with version 2.4, and we are confident that Class(y) will continue
to consistently outperform all competition, both in features and in
execution speed.

Complete compatibility with version 2.0 will be maintained - there will
be no need to recompile existing Class(y) classes, although
recompilation will maximize class creation performance benefits.

Purchasers of Class(y) v2.0 on or after July 1, 1994 will qualify for a
free upgrade to v2.4 (a shipping and handling charge will apply).

The upgrade to version 2.4 will be priced at (US) $79.95.  Purchasers
will qualify for a free upgrade to version 2.5 when it becomes available.


Class(y) v2.5
-------------

In addition to the performance enhancements to be introduced in v2.4,
Class(y) v2.5 will include a library of collection classes, complete
with source code.  The library includes standard object-oriented
collection classes such as sets, dictionaries, and bags, allowing
collections of objects throughout an application to be managed via a
simple and consistent interface.  To achieve maximum performance, the
collection class library is based on a kernel of C++ classes.

The collection classes were developed by Robert DiFalco as part of
another project under development at AppSolutions (see accompanying
announcement, "AppSolutions Expands Development Team").  These classes
have proven invaluable in our other projects, and they are being
included in Class(y) v2.5 to allow our customers to take advantage of
them in their own systems.

Also new to Class(y) 2.5 will be support for default instance variable
values, inline method definitions, and improved support for storage of
objects to disk.  The Enhanced Object Inspector has been updated to
provide more detailed information about object contents.  Other features
will be announced closer to the time of release.


Performance Enhancements: Technical Overview
--------------------------------------------

Class creation in version 2.0 was slowed by its heavy use of Clipper-level
objects to represent methods and instance variables during class
creation.  However, in most cases, these objects were not required once
class creation was complete.

Class(y) v2.4 implements class creation completely in C++ and Assembler,
and will only create Clipper-level objects when they are requested.  The
creation of these objects is only required by classes which make
advanced use of Class(y)'s metaclass architecture, such as the Enhanced
Object Inspector.

Improvements in message sending performance have been achieved by the
"flattening" of class hierarchies.  In previous versions of Class(y),
when a message was sent to an object, a search was performed in the
object's class; if the message was not found, the superclass was
searched, and so on until the correct message was found.  Thus, as class
hierarchies became deeper, the average performance of messages sent to
objects was reduced.

To eliminate this effect, Class(y) v2.4 can (optionally) take advantage
of the increased availability of memory in protected mode to flatten the
class hierarchy, so that each class contains a copy of all the messages
which it inherits from its ancestors.  This means that messages will
always be found in an object's class on the first try, and the depth of
a class hierarchy no longer has any direct effect on performance.

However, in real mode Clipper applications, little or no advantage is
gained by flattening a class hierarchy, since the amount of extra memory
consumed tends to increase virtual memory "thrashing", negating any
performance benefit which might otherwise be obtained. For this reason,
and to support other environments with limited memory, Class(y) v2.4
will allow class flattening to be optionally disabled.



AppSolutions Expands Development Team                    August 1, 1994
=====================================

AppSolutions, Inc. is delighted to announce that Robert DiFalco has
joined its development team, as the architect and chief developer of an
application framework class library for Class(y). Robert previously
worked on the Clipper development team at Nantucket Corp., and
subsequently at Computer Associates International, Inc.  He was a key
architect and developer of Clipper 5.2.

Robert has spent many years studying the issues involved in the
programming of human interaction with computers - in short, user
interfaces.  He has examined systems such as Next's NextStep, Apple's
Newton, and of course Microsoft Windows.  Drawing inspiration from these
diverse sources, he has designed a highly portable, consistent and
simple architecture for application development, based on sound
object-oriented design principles.

The resulting application framework will first be released in the form
of a class library for Class(y).  Support for other platforms is planned
for future versions.



New Company Name                                          December 1993
================

We are proud to announce that as of December 1993 we have a new company
name: AppSolutions, Inc. (formerly ObjecTech, Inc.)

But don't be confused.  You will find the same great people and commitment
to service that you've become accustomed to.  Our address and phone
numbers have remained unchanged.



ExoSpace                                                       July 1993
========


ExoSpace is an exciting new product jointly developed by AppSolutions, Inc.
and SofDesign International, Inc.  It allows Clipper applications to run
in protected mode, giving applications direct access to extended memory,
reducing or eliminating the need for virtual memory swapping, and
improving performance.  It eliminates most memory problems experienced
by Clipper applications and simplifies linking, since code overlaying
under ExoSpace is completely automatic and requires no user
intervention.  ExoSpace replaces the Clipper virtual memory (VM) system
with a protected-mode VM system licensed from Rational Systems Inc., the
same reliable VM system used in Lotus 1-2-3 and in products from such
companies as Borland and IBM.  ExoSpace thus completely eliminates VM
integrity errors (a.k.a. 5333 errors) in Clipper.

Computer Associates International, Inc. (CA), the publishers of
CA-Clipper, recognized the importance of ExoSpace and in August 1993, CA
acquired ExoSpace and all rights to its technology from AppSolutions and
SofDesign.

AppSolutions highly recommends CA-ExoSpace to users of Class(y).  In
many cases, ExoSpace improves performance of object-oriented code
dramatically, by reducing or eliminating the frequent virtual memory
swapping which occurs in systems which make heavy use of objects. In
addition, ExoSpace can help in identifying the source of low-level
errors in C and Assembler code, whether due to third-party or in-house
software.

Information about CA-Clipper ExoSpace can be obtained from CA by calling
1-800-CALL-CAI (800-225-5224).  AppSolutions will gladly answer any
questions you may have about using ExoSpace with Class(y).


                             <end>

