Tenon Intersystems : Press Release

WebTen Breaks Macintosh Web Performance Barrier

Fastest Web Server on MacOS creates a new standard in Web service for Apple

Santa Barbara, CA, July 29, 1997. Tenon Intersystems today announced WebTen 1.1, an industrial-strength, high-performance Apache Web server for Power Macs. WebTen is the world's fastest Macintosh-based Web server, offering a performance improvement (as measured by Ziff Davis Labs) that can be as much as 300% over WebSTAR, the leading Macintosh Web server.

WebTen 1.1's new features include improved scheduling of CGIs during heavy cache usage, reduced memory and disk footprints, improved behavior in low-memory conditions, enhanced performance and reliability of Tenon's TCP stack under load conditions, updated caching software, and an enhanced user interface.

In addition to being the fastest Macintosh Web server, WebTen is the only caching proxy Web server for Macintosh and the first Macintosh Web server to support "true" virtual hosting. Virtual hosting is made possible by Tenon's advanced TCP stack, which can replace OpenTransport and provide features and performance not yet available with OpenTransport. With virtual hosting, ISPs and Web providers can support multiple Web servers on a single machine - each with different host names, IP addresses, and URLs - and have them appear to be completely separate sites. A "Virtual Host Challenged" plug-in compatibility mode accommodates Macintosh plug-ins that assume a static, top-level document root.

Apache runs in Tenon's multi-threaded, pre-emptive multitasking environment, and has been extended with support for WebSTAR plug-ins and AppleScript CGIs. Tenon's Apache extensions enable WebTen to support WebSTAR 2.0 plug-ins and Macintosh AppleScript CGIs, as well as standard Apache modules, industry-standard Perl script, shell script, and application program-based CGIs. This dual strategy of supporting both Apple and UNIX Web extensions gives WebTen the largest family of CGIs of any known Web server. Because WebTen's multitasking execution environment is based on Rhapsody kernel APIs and supports Rhapsody TCP sockets, Tenon's enhanced Apache will easily transition to Apple's next-generation Rhapsody OS.

WebTen is based on the latest Apache 1.2 with Tenon extensions. Apache 1.2 is fully compliant with HTTP/1.1, which allows for greater performance and efficiency when transferring files. WebTen's Web-based browser interface enables local or remote administration via any standard browser. Extensive logging options are available, using Macintosh plug-ins or the built-in features of Apache. WebTen 1.1 is available for U.S. $495 via download on the Internet at:

/products/webten
WebTen 1.1 is a free upgrade for all WebTen 1.0 customers.

Tenon has been shipping award-winning UNIX, X, and internet software for the Macintosh since 1991. Since Apple's NeXT acquisition, Tenon has extended their unique "UNIX virtual machine" technology to produce a set of "Rhapsody-Ready" internet applications. WebTen is the first offering in this series.

•Tenon and WebTen are trademarks of Tenon Intersystems.

•UNIX is a registered trademark in the United States and other countries, licensed exclusively through X/Open Company Limited.

•WebTen includes software developed by the Apache Group for use in the Apache HTTP server project and Squid which is derived from the cached software from the ARPA-funded Harvest research project.

•All other product names are trademarks of their respective holders.