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Keeping an eye on ads: The Mactive AdWatch system can track advertising components in-house on a proprietary client over the Internet in a web browser. |
Mactive sees technology's future
-- and it's thin (client that is)
LAS VEGAS -- "If your ad stacks are active, you might just like Mactive." A tidbit of pure doggerel, that refers to Mactive Inc. of Melbourne, Fla., the supplier with a solution that's full of beans. Java beans, that is.
Just what is Mactive? To quote its own explanation, "Mactive Inc. provides innovative products that enable publishers to control their advertising revenues."
This control is enabled through a tightly turned out, cross-platform product called AdBase. This small but thoughtful company, a wholly owned subsidiary of Fusio of Helsingborg, Sweden, a systems provider with installations in Sweden, Norway, Denmark and Germany, is all about ads and integration.
With a long list of clients both in the United States and abroad, it's obvious that many newspapers agree. Mactive clients include the San Jose Mercury News, Contra Costa Newspapers and the Alameda Newspaper Group (ANG). The Chicago Sun-Times, the Philadelphia Inquirer, the Orange County Register and the Plain Dealer of Cleveland are all on board, as well as the London Daily Mail.
And they're all wild about Java ... maybe not right now, but they'll all be wired in the future and not on caffeine. For the last two years, Mactive has been working on porting all the code objects in the C++ language that AdBase uses to Java Services. And voilá, we have Java AdBase, which means everything AdBase can do could be enabled on any Java-compliant web browser, although Mactive prefers Microsoft Internet Explorer or Netscape Navigator.
Java Services means Java Beans ...and "once the Bean is defined, it becomes very user-independent easy to assemble them according to the needs of the customers," said Mactive's Java expert, Lars Jborn.
Then the client can access just the needed Beans to run in the browser, meaning virtually instant custom applications for every need. It's a sound strategy, fast and svelte ... make that downright thin.
Yes, Mactive has seen the future, and it's thin, from a client standpoint. To take, make, bill or move ads, any computer with a web browser should be able to do whatever is needed. No more worries if Tom, Dick or Harry has that application on his computer, or is running Windows XP or Macintosh OS; the Beans make the platform irrelevant.
However, AdBase and the associated applications that reside on the server do require the server to be running Microsoft 2000, Sun Solaris 2.6 or better. The associated database is either Microsoft SQL or Oracle,
Client PCs with the full non-Java AdBase application should be running Windows NT, 2000 or XP with at least a Pentium III processor and a 17-inch monitor. But that's all in the process of changing.
According to Jborn, the current full client-server model "will never be able to meet current needs," which is why Mactive decided to go thin with Java AdBase in 2003, which will have a lighter footprint on current and future network bandwidth, as well as cross-platform capabilities beyond the current product.
So what is this thing called AdBase, which is sold by Mactive as "all about ads."
It has several distinct parts, starting with:
AdBooker, which with one program, books every type of ad -- classified, display -- that a publication could want.
Graphics Browser, which can search for and display ad logos and images.
Customer Manager, which tracks customer contacts.
AdReport, which puts all the AdBase data into a form that can be used for analysis and decision-making.
Contract Manager, which monitors the status of each ad contract and its fulfillment status.
AdRater, the rate-figuring engine of AdBase, that can handle, or be programmed to handle any combination of rate structures of any ad.
AdBase, the Internet-based ad order entry tools tied to customers' databases, enabling ads to be submitted from any location.
Other Internet-based tools include eProofs for electronic proofing, Digital Ad Verification, for digital presentation and delivery of ads on completed pages and Interclass, for publishing ads on the Internet.
AdWatch can be Internet-based or not, but it tracks and manages the ad components in the office or from a web browser.
And to top it all off, there's the accounts receivable program, Money Manager, PageLayout, for dummying classified and display ad positions in all the publication's sections, and PageLink, a Quark XPress XTension that imports the ad stacks into Quark XPress.
Oh, I nearly forgot to mention the new SalesAssistant, and new built-in credit check software.
And XML ... Mactive is partnering with Ixiasoft of Montreal, to embed the native XML storage capabilities of Ixiasoft's Textml server into Mactive's newly developing archiving and search component. With XML, Mactive's got the chops, and the beans to be a 21st century answer for any publication's advertising.
-- G.P.
Mactive Inc.,
(321) 254-5559,
e-mail: info@mactiveinc.com.
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