Future of APP enterprise ?

[ndelobel]

Hi,

I've heard that APP enterprise will disappear to be integrated directly to APE.

Someone can say me more about that and when this change will be applied ?

APP tags (PI like <?th 2mm>) will they be kept in the next versions of APP or just javascript will be used ?

Thanks.

Regards,

Nicolas Delobel

[GarethOakes]

Hi Nicolas,

I don't know PTC's plans but can confirm we did receive a letter indicating their intent to sunset the APP Enterprise product. My understanding is that future releases of APP will not include APP Enterprise, and Publishing Engine will be promoted as the replacement. I'm led to believe this also means the APP OCX component will be simultaneously sunset. It is unclear whether there is a replacement for APP OCX planned or not.

None of these changes affect the APP Desktop or APP core functionality. Both the PIs and Javascript FOM will be supported for the foreseeable future, to the best of my limited knowledge.

Interested to hear an official statement or from anyone who has further information. We support a number of customers with APP Enterprise systems.

Cheers,

Gareth

[SimonTaylor]

Hello

Yes, PTC will be putting Enterprise into 'sustained support' with a view to 'end of life' the product. It is not something we're happy about doing, but it is something we have been talking about for a few years now. We need to allow our developers to focus on the core APP engine and while we have a duplicate of functionality across server-based PDF output, it makes sense to do this now and standardise on Publishing Engine. Our intention is to provide a way to migrate to Publishing Engine for our Enterprise customers which is as painless as we can make it. Gareth is correct that the OCX version will also be retired. Enterprise customers should all have received a letter about this from their sales contacts.

I think there has been some confusion over whether this means that the APP product will retire too, so let me be clear that this only applies to the Enterprise component. Desktop (and Server) are still going to be available and maintained. There are no plans to end those products at all.

We will not be taking the processing instruction stuff out of APP either. When we add new features we also try, where possible, to provide processing instructions and macros. However, this isn't always possible or sensible. JavaScript is our preferred code platform and the focus of our development in APP.

I hope this helps

Simon