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The Client Utility A Split-Capability System

The Client Utility, aka E-Speak Beta 2.2, is available here.

See also http://c2.com/cgi/wiki?ClientUtility.

The Client Utility was a project started at HP Labs in late 1995 as an implementation of the The Global Computer. A system built around the Client Utility Architecture was released in December 1999 as the Beta 2.2 version of HP's middleware product E-speak. Following that release, the product was retargeted to B2B platforms. The resulting E-speak 3.14 release in April 2000 was substantially different from the Client Utility, but it did retain many of its features. HP abandoned all its middleware products, including e-speak, in May 2001. At that time, five companies were using e-speak as a critical component of their businesses.

The Client Utility Architecture was produced before the implementation was started. (It is also available in PDF from http://www.hpl.hp.com/techreports/2001/HPL-2001-136.html.) Although this document represents our thinking early in the design process, it does not describe the E-speak Beta 2.2 as delivered. However, it is the best tutorial available. Other publications of parts of the Client Utility architecture are

• E-speak E-xplained, CACM, vol. 46. #7, pp. 113-118, July (2003)
• Using Split Capabilities for Access Control, with G. Rozas, A. Banerji, R. Gupta, IEEE Software, vol. 20, #1, pp 42-49, January (2003)
• Customizable Description and Dynamic Discovery for Web Services, ACM Conference on Electronic Commerce (ACM EC'04), New York, 2004.