Bluestone Software Lays Foundation for Internet Operating Environment With Total-E-Server; Union of J2EE's JSP 1.1, Servlets 2.2, and EJB 1.1 Technologies with XML and Bluestone's Legendary Performance Creates Unparalleled E-Business Infrastructure.

Business Editors/Hi-Tech Writers

JavaOne 2000, Booth No. 607

SAN FRANCISCO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--June 5, 2000

Bluestone(R) Software, Inc. (Nasdaq: BLSW), a leader in business-to-Web and wireless technologies, today announced Bluestone Total-e-Server(TM), the next generation of Bluestone's award-winning Sapphire/Web(R) Application Server, and the Application Server edition of Bluestone's comprehensive, standards-based Total-e-Business(TM) platform. Based on Sun Microsystem's J2EE (Java 2 Platform, Enterprise Edition) specification and using XML for internal communication and external integration services, Total-e-Server underpins the scalable, fault tolerant Internet Operating Environment required by organizations that demand maximum performance from their Web-enabled, e-business solutions. A sponsor of this year's JavaOne Developer Conference, Bluestone will be exhibiting in booth No. 607 at the Moscone Center, San Francisco, June 6-9.

A number of Total-e-Server customers and systems integrators will join Bluestone at JavaOne, taking part in events throughout the show. Executives from Gazoontite.com, Food.com, S2 Systems, Favemail, ClearLogic, Decision Consultants, and Agency.com will be on hand to discuss their successes with e-business solutions powered by Total-e-Server. "Technology Insights: E-Business Challenges and Solutions," Bluestone's invitation-only executive discussion and cocktail reception on Tuesday, June 6, offers guests a rare mix of business and technology insights from representatives of Bluestone, Total-e-Server customers and integrators, the Gartner Group, and InformationWeek Online.

Total-e-Server showcases Bluestone's mastery as a premiere provider of Application Server-driven e-business platforms. Chief among the Total-e-Server highlights are robust implementations of J2EE technologies, including Enterprise JavaBeans (EJB) 1.1, Java Servlets 2.2, and JavaServer Pages (JSP) 1.1, including Taglib support. Bluestone enhances standard EJB functionality with global-class services not yet defined by the EJB specification, including XML persistence mapping, Dynamic XSL Stylesheets, load balancing, application management, security, and Universal Listener Framework (ULF) scheduling services. Total-e-Server also boasts a number of performance-oriented facilities unique to Bluestone, including Customer Facing Fault Tolerance, Internet Quality of Service (IQS(TM)), and Hot Versioning(TM).

"Customers are no longer writing to the old operating systems like Windows and UNIX, but rather to the Internet," explained John H. Capobianco, senior vice president and chief marketing officer for Bluestone Software. "Bluestone is leading the industry by creating an open Internet Operating Environment based on the Web, J2EE and XML, and featuring the scalability, security, fault tolerance and, most importantly, openness required by our customers, and software and integration partners today. Bluestone's Total-e-Server creates the Internet Operating Environment--much like an operating system--providing a consistent environment for enterprise-wide application development and deployment."

Total-e-Server Revealed

To provide the application development, deployment, integration, and management facilities needed for global-class applications, Total-e-Server comprises the following components:

-- Bluestone Universal Business Server for TeB(TM)

-- Bluestone XML-Server for TeB(TM)

-- Bluestone Universal Listener Framework for TeB(TM)

-- Bluestone Application Manager for TeB(TM)

-- Bluestone Security Console for TeB(TM)

-- Bluestone Connector Capability(TM)

-- Bluestone J2EE Developer(TM)

Bluestone Universal Business Server for TeB is the 100% Pure Java Application Server deployment engine at the heart of Total-e-Server. Bluestone Universal Business Server for TeB is based entirely on J2EE and includes robust implementations of JSP 1.1 and Taglibs to dramatically expand the audience of Total-e-Server developers. Together, JSP 1.1 and Taglibs create a straightforward scripting language that is extensible, reusable, and accessible to the vast pool of HTML and XML programmers. Bluestone Universal Business Server for TeB provides comprehensive support for JSP 1.1 with Taglibs, including a JSP engine that is fully compatible with the JSP 1.1 standard.

With a complete implementation of Java Servlets API 2.2, Bluestone Universal Business Server for TeB also provides a standard mechanism for building dynamic Web applications that are portable across hardware, Web server, and Application Server platforms.

The Bluestone Universal Business Server for TeB also employs a Dynamic XSL Engine that lets users automatically detect client device types and generate the proper delivery format, whether it is a cell phone, palmtop device, desktop browser, application, or other client type.

To establish the global-class performance required by an Internet Operating Environment, Bluestone Universal Business Server for TeB extends EJB functionality with services not yet defined by the EJB specification. Specifically, Bluestone Universal Business Server for TeB runs the JSP and Servlet engines in the same Application Server instance as the EJB server. Unique to Bluestone, this in-process deployment technique eliminates the remote network calls that degrade Web and EJB application performance. Moreover, the technique ensures that JSPs and Servlets enjoy the Customer-Facing Fault Tolerance, scalability, security, and performance provided by the Bluestone Universal Business Server for TeB.

Similarly, Bluestone's EJB 1.1 implementation leverages the core Bluestone Universal Business Server for TeB strengths noted above, as well as IQS, Hot Versioning, application management and development capabilities, and integration services via XML and Bluestone Connectors.

Bluestone Universal Business Server for TeB relies on XML for a number of services, including the persistence map that permanently stores the state of an application. XML gives the Bluestone Universal Business Server for TeB high-performance support for fine-grained objects in an EJB. Taking advantage of the pluggable persistence model of its EJB server, Bluestone offers an alternative persistence technology via its strategic relationship with THOUGHT Inc. (See separate release, "Bluestone Software and THOUGHT Inc. Expand Container Managed Persistence Options for Total-e-Server, June 5, 2000.)

Bluestone XML-Server for TeB provides robust XML and legacy integration services, establishing an unparalleled level of e-business systems integration. An advanced XML-based Integration Server for data interchange and loosely coupled application integration, Bluestone XML-Server for TeB draws data from heterogeneous sources, dynamically converts it to XML, and performs event-based data transformations. The server also features a transformation engine that performs XML-to-XML document translations and DTD-to-DTD translations to facilitate communications with customers and partners via disparate DTDs and documents. As a result, Total-e-Server ties together disparate data sources and applications to unite business systems within a company, as well as with third-party partners, suppliers, and vendors, creating a powerful, cost-effective engine for sharing data and documents in EDI, supply chain, and other enterprise or extraprise communications.

Bluestone Universal Listener Framework for TeB is unique to Bluestone and further automates application-to-application interaction within Total-e-Server. Through its Mobile Device Server, Message Server, Queuing Server, and Scheduling Server, the Universal Listener Framework (ULF) monitors and acts on data communications transmitted via email, FTP, Web, Wireless Access Protocol, Java Message Service, MQSeries, CICS, broadcast, multicast, and other services. For instance, a retailer's internal inventory application may transmit a "low stock" alert, which prompts the ULF to initiate a purchase order request and then issue the approved purchase order to the appropriate vendor. The ULF Console provides a graphical interface to the ULF servers, eliminating the need to hand code ULF service parameters, and expediting company response to customer and partner demands for new or enhanced services.

Bluestone Application Manager for TeB works in concert with Bluestone Universal Business Server for TeB to create a dynamic, Web-enabled environment that automatically scales applications to meet fluctuating needs, balances loads to prevent performance decline, provides a fault tolerant architecture, and manages, controls, and reports upon all interactions that transpire across the entire Web infrastructure. The resulting e-business platform or Internet Operating Environment provides the scalable, fault tolerant, high-performance infrastructure required to conduct mission-critical, non-stop e-business activities. Integration with HP OpenView, Unicenter, and Tivoli lets users tie Bluestone application management into their enterprise management systems.

In addition, Bluestone Application Manager for TeB features event notification services, which enables an application to send an actionable event to the application manager. In practice, the event notification service can be used by application developers and JSP designers to perform click stream analysis, report on security conditions such as unauthorized access attempts, denote performance exceptions, or capture any other type of event.

Bluestone Security Console for TeB establishes a common security framework that gives JSP developers and application administrators highly granular control over e-business applications security, providing role-based access control at every level. The easy-to-use, wizard-based console lets developers set security levels for applications, pages within applications, user interaction points on pages, or on each information resource that an application accesses. Bluestone Security Console for TeB works with both LDAP directories and databases to perform user authentication. The console also has enhanced authentication support for X.509 certificates and simplified implementation of SSL to non-SSL switching. The Bluestone Security Console for TeB also integrates with existing user profiling systems, as well as the Bluestone J2EE Developer.

Bluestone Connector Capability provides a broad array of application integration services to legacy systems such as SAP, PeopleSoft, and IBM mainframe IMS, CICS, and MQSeries applications. Bluestone Connectors are also available for commerce systems, such as CyberCash, Taxware, Verity, OpenMarket, UPS Worldship, and others.

Bluestone J2EE Developer is the development environment for creating and deploying EJBs. J2EE developers can use Bluestone J2EE Developer to set transaction services and modify resource files. The environment automates critical development functions, such as the creation of home and remote interfaces and deployment descriptors for EJBs. Integration with Bluestone Security Console for TeB expedites the inclusion of security services within Total-e-Server applications. Bluestone J2EE Developer also provides the container managed persistence development tool for Total-e-Server. A 100% Pure Java development environment, Bluestone J2EE Developer will run on any platform, including Linux, Unix, and Windows NT.

Bluestone's Total-e-Server will be generally available on July 1, 2000 with pricing starting at $60,000.

About Bluestone Software

Bluestone(R) Software, Inc., provider of Enterprise Interaction Management software, is a leader in business-to-Web and wireless technologies. Companies deploying e-business applications, like Avnet, CDNow, Food.com, MCI WorldCom, Planalytics, Reliance National, and Time Inc., rely on Bluestone's Total-e-Business(TM) platform, to provide comprehensive e-business platforms, Internet-class infrastructures, and robust integration services that e-business success demands. Bluestone is headquartered at 300 Stevens Drive, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, 19113-1597. For more information, please call 888-Bluestone or 610-915-5000, email [e-mail], or visit http://www.bluestone.com.

Editor's Note: Artwork is available at http://www.bluestone.com/news, from http://www.businesswire.com in a Smart News Release, or upon request from Bluestone press relations.

Bluestone and Sapphire/Web are registered trademarks, and Total-e-Business, Hot Versioning, IQS, Bluestone XML Suite, Total-e-Server and the Total-e-Server component listed above are trademarks of Bluestone Software, Inc. All other names, brands or products may be trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective owners.

Certain statements in this press release constitute forward-looking statements as such term is defined in the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Forward looking statements involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors, including those contained in Bluestone's publicly filed reports with the Securities and Exchange Commission, which may cause Bluestone's actual results, performance, or achievements or those of its customers or its industry to be materially different from the future results, performance or achievements expressed or implied by these forward looking statements. Specifically, the Company's beliefs with respect to the business opportunities presented by e-business and the Company's ability to profitably market and deploy its product solutions may prove to be inaccurate. In light of the significant uncertainties inherent in these forward looking statements, the information in this press release should not be considered a representation by the Company or any other person that Bluestone's objectives and plans will be achieved.