Macromedia Software Pushes Internet Apps Onto Phones

Macromedia, San Francisco, added instant-message (IM) functionality to a new version of its ColdFusion development tool and application server, released Monday.

The new IM integration, along with event-management capabilities, offered in Macromedia ColdFusion MX 7 enable developers to extend existing Web-based applications onto mobile devices, said Dave Gruber, senior product manager for the San Francisco-based software company.

"Instant messaging can be a great interface for talking to machines that are running applications," Gruber said. "There's nothing that says a buddy list has to be people. You can also use the IM network for machine-to-machine communications. Our event gateway lets ColdFusion connect Web-based applications to mobile phones through IM or the short message service (SMS)."

Besides IM and event management functions, the updated MX 7 version also adds a new tool that lets developers add a single tag around a large block of html code, transforming Web content into PDF or Flash Paper document format, for high-quality printing. In addition, developers can now enable their Web-based applications to produce structured, business reports.

Available as either a standalone application server or as an add-on to other J2EE app servers from Sun Microsystems, BEA Systems or IBM, ColdFusion MX 7 is available as a $1,299 Standard Edition and $5,999 Enterprise Edition.