Traction Software Internationalizes Enterprise Weblog Platform With Release 3.0.

Business Editors/High-Tech Writers

PROVIDENCE, R.I.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Nov. 17, 2003

Traction 3.0 Delivers Internationalization, Authentication,

Compatibility, Extensibility for Business and Government Customers

Around the Globe

Traction Software, Inc., the leader in Enterprise Weblog software, today announced the release of Traction(R) TeamPage(TM) Release 3.0. Release 3.0 extends Traction's ease-of-use, simple deployment and a unique permissioned access model with new capabilities, which deliver enhanced productivity, knowledge sharing, communication and collaboration, making Traction the enterprise platform of choice for commercial and government applications. New features include: internationalization, enterprise authentication, a new extensible framework for user interface customization and branding, enterprise search engine compatibility, and enhanced support for standards. The new release of Traction's Instant Publisher(TM) Client adds round-trip WYSIWYG editing as well as integrated one-click publishing from Microsoft's Internet Explorer using a new .NET architecture.

"The demand for proven enterprise Weblog solutions for working communication and knowledge sharing within the enterprise is growing rapidly in the U.S and around the world," said Greg Lloyd, President of Traction Software. "Traction 3.0 is designed to give companies and government organizations such as the Department of Defense the ability to easily integrate TeamPage into their enterprise and quickly leverage the benefits it brings to the table."

Traction 3.0 introduces new features all designed to make it the enterprise platform of choice for commercial and government users. These features include:

-- Internationalization: The Traction 3.0 platform builds on

previous support for capture, search, editing, browsing,

automatic email and newsfeed syndication of content that can

be encoded using the Unicode (UTF-8) standard, including all

Western European, Slavic, Japanese, Chinese, Arabic, Hebrew

and other languages. With 3.0, Traction adds; Unicode project

names, user names, labels and file names; an Internationalized

User Interface, which simultaneously permits forms, buttons

and message text to be shown using different locales selected

by multiple users; localization that can be performed by

Traction, its partners, or customers using Sun Microsystems 

Java standard resource packaging; Japanese language 

localization provided by Traction partner Applied Knowledge

Systems, Inc.; Western and non-Western language word boundary

segmentation using Java's internationalization capabilities to

create content indices for mixed as well as single language

articles and comments.

-- Extensible Authentication: Enterprise customers frequently

maintain directories of account names, passwords and

role-based permissions using LDAP or Microsoft Active

Directory servers. Traction 3.0 introduces an extensible

plug-in authentication mechanism that allows external

administration of user account names, passwords and role-based

permissions. Traction provides executable and Java language

source code for LDAP and Active Directory plug-ins, as well as

a run-time extensible interface that can be used to interface

with micropayment and single sign-on solutions. Support for

TLS/SSL encryption and optional X.509 certificate based

authentication was introduced with Traction Release 2.5.

-- Extensible User Interface (Skins): Traction's new Skin

Definition Language (SDL) makes it possible to create a new

Traction look and feel using only HTML editing tools. SDL is

valuable for customers looking to make Traction work as part

of their internal (or external) portal, seamlessly extending

the look and feel of existing sites with Traction generated

content, links and controls. Traction can serve all skins

simultaneously, allowing customers to choose one based on

personal preference, or have it chosen automatically based on

the browser and device being used. Traction provides five

skins with the product, including one that is optimized for

Palm OS, Microsoft PocketPC or Blackberry handheld devices.

Traction 3.0 introduces a new family of CSS driven skins that

provide a simple Web interface that is easily extensible using

style sheet control.

-- Enterprise Search Engine Compatibility: Enterprise customers

frequently want to expose the content of key internal data

sources for enterprise wide search and content analysis.

Traction 3.0 articles, comments and file attachments can be

completely or selectively exposed to spidering by search and

data mining engines such as Verity Ultraseek, Google, Tacit

Knowledge Systems, Autonomy and Clear Forrest. Each Traction

article is independently indexed, making it simple for

enterprise search and mining applications to show the title

and content of the search hits, and link back to the correct

article in Traction. Enterprise search engines work in

parallel with the continuously updated international language

search engine built into Traction.

-- Support for Syndication and Weblog Standards: Traction 3.0

extends interoperability with best of class support for

publishing and syndication protocols. Traction supports RSS 

2.0 for content syndication, as well as Blogger and MetaWeblog

XML-RPC API's for publishing and editing of Traction content

using popular blogging and RSS aggregator programs such as

NewsGator (Windows), NewsMonster (Mozilla/Firebird - all

platforms) and NetNewsWire (MacOS X). Traction provides a

plug-in extension to make Traction Instant Publisher V2 work

as a publishing extension for the popular NewsGator news

aggregator that runs within Microsoft Outlook. Traction makes

it easy for readers to create a custom RSS feed from

combinations of projects, topic labels, authors and search

expressions. Traction 3.0 supports password-protected RSS feed

for aggregators that support Basic http: (realm) protection.

-- Web Services Standards: Traction supports SOAP bindings (in

addition to email and http interfaces) that permit external

applications to post automatically generated messages to the

Traction server. The SOAP interface includes the ability to

post MIME encoded file attachments (graphics, office

documents, data files) as well as HTML text. Automatically

generated content can include live links to the precise source

of business information, geographic location, or any other

content that augments the time, author and context information

that Traction automatically logs for each article or comment.

Traction's wrapper kit can be used to easily create SOAP

wrappers for any Journal database, relationship or other

function exposed as part of Traction's Java Software

Developers Kit (SDK). The wrapper kit and SDK are provided to

Traction customers without additional charge.

-- Traction Instant Publisher V 2.0: Version 2.0 of the Traction

Instant Publisher (TIP V2) is a new .NET implementation of

Traction's clip and collect client for Microsoft Windows

environments. TIP V2 adds round-trip WYSIWYG editing for

Traction articles and comments. Formatting tools include

bullet and numbered lists; indented blocks; as bold, italic

and underscore styled text; inline graphics and a drag and

drop or browse and select file attachment window. TIP V2

includes built-in screen capture that you can use to select

and publish any rectangular region of your computer screen,

allowing capture of graphics from any Windows application.

Users can publish any selected block of text and graphics

directly from Microsoft Internet explorer, with automatic HTML

cleanup, relative link conversion, and automatic creation of a

back-link to the original source. You can copy and paste or

drag and drop text from any Windows application.

Pricing & Availability

A preview edition of Traction 3.0 is immediately available, with delivery of a final edition in December 2003. Traction TeamPage 3.0 workgroup pricing starts at $4,995 per server. A personal edition - Traction Communicator(TM) sells for $249. Traction 3.0 is free to all Traction Customers entitled to receive software updates.

About Traction's Enterprise Weblog Software

Traction TeamPage is an easy-to-use powerful solution that allows everyday corporate users to collect, link and organize information from e-mail, the Web, Office and other sources and deliver it organized by time, topic and importance to improve productivity, knowledge sharing, communications and collaboration. Traction's easy to use hypertext journaling system can be used to label, cross-link and deliver relevant content gathered from disparate sources, and plugs into an existing Web infrastructure. Traction's unique Instant Publisher allows users to selected and post text, pictures, links and attachments directly from Internet Explorer, or drag-and-drop content from any Microsoft Windows application.

Users who have been granted permission within TeamPage can update and enrich content, easily adding comments, cross-links, topic labels and action flags. To be kept abreast of news in the Enterprise Weblog, users have real-time web access, and can receive a daily Executive Summary(TM) email newsletter, which summarizes new information by project and importance, with click through access to the full story.

About Traction Software

Traction Software is the leader in Enterprise Weblog software, delivering easy to use tools for groups and teams to communicate, share, organize and link all-sources information in context. The firm's flagship product, Traction(R) TeamPage(TM), makes the business internet a writable web that works as easily as email. Traction's pending patent covers the fundamental indexing, cross-reference and navigational elements that jointly make the Traction platform unique. The company distributes its products directly and through global partners. Traction Software was founded in 1996 and is located in Providence, Rhode Island. Investors include In-Q-Tel, Slater Interactive and private individuals. Learn more at www.tractionsoftware.com.

Traction is a registered trademark and Traction TeamPage is a trademark of Traction Software, Inc.