Distributed Internet Architecture

Better known expanded name for Windows DNA. Also see note at the end of this page

An implementation framework, now superseded by 2002 MicrosoftDotNet, proposed in 1999 by Microsoft for a one-stop solution for all computing needs for medium to larger Enterprises.

It was aimed at the market segment that traditionally deployed mainframe based solutions, and at the same time designed to check the growing influence of the SunJava? consortium, who have championed the EnterpriseJavaBeans alternative to Mainframe Computing.

Key technology and Components include:

TCP/IP based networking
Thin client Web GUI based frontend served by ASP
XML messaging, evolving to SOAP
UniversalDataAccess
COM+ to provide transaction and security services for server based COM objects

WindowsTwoThousand, especially the server version, is the flagship product that provides the means to implement this all Microsoft solution. Another key product, BizTalk, only made available much later.

COM+ (ComPlus) is the revamped MicrosoftTransactionServer (MTS) that provided message queuing and event model on top of the ComponentObjectModel (COM). COM objects have been around for years before DNA from MicroSoft, and it is an example of implementation of InterfaceBasedProgramming. An article somewhere described VisualBasic, now called VbClassic, as the GUI version of a COM programming tool. Perhaps the ease of creating COM objects by VbClassic contributed to its popularity. The Internet enabled version of COM object is called Activex, which has been taken out from the web/server scene after MicrosoftDotNet came out as the DNA replacement framework.

Although MicrosoftCorporation has been withdrawing material about DNA since early days of DotNet, many key component technologies within this architecture are expected to stay useful till WindowsLonghorn becomes a reality, and at mid 2004 that date is 2007 the earliest.

And the MicrosoftIndigo component of the next windows may not arrive until the server version of WindowsLonghorn, and until then ComPlus will be used by DotNet for transaction services.

For people interested in this topic, a must read book is EssentialCom

For a good technical overview reference, check out the slides and accompanying text by DonBox (1999, then at DevelopMentor)

URL for Slides -> http://www.aspxnet.de/COM_RCD/Powerpoints/Distributed%20Computing%20with%20COM+%20Part%201.ppt URL for talk -> http://www.aspxnet.de/COM_RCD/Transcriptions/Distributed%20Computing%20with%20COM+%20Part%201.rtf

References: Microsoft example - http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=243abaa0-dd03-4fbc-b58f-5da61839f948&displaylang=en

xml-dev archive http://lists.xml.org/archives/xml-dev/199909/msg00539.html

Computerworld - http://www.computerworld.com/developmenttopics/development/webdev/story/0,10801,28907,00.html

Found a good description of this still on MS site in mid 2004, at http://www.microsoft.com/technet/prodtechnol/windows2000serv/technologies/iis/deploy/projplan/componen.mspx

The article is actually chapter 13 taken from book Professional Active Server Pages 3.0, and go by the name of Components and Web Application Architecture.

Check it out before it is forever gone.

Microsoft has a paper on the ...lessons learned from building N-tier Applications using Microsoft Windows DNA. It contrasts DNA with DotNet setups

See http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/dnbda/html/bdadotnetarch001.asp

Other Microsoft resources relevant to DNA are:

Introducing DNA at http://www.microsoft.com/technet/itsolutions/intranet/plan/introdna.mspx#XSLTsection124121120120
Developing For the Enterprise at http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/vsentpro/html/veovrdevelopingforenterprise.asp
Unraveling Windows DNA at http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/dnhess/html/hess051099.asp
UDr GUI 1997 PDC views at http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/dnguion/html/msdn_guipdc.asp
...Thinking in Layers ... at http://www.microsoft.com/mind/0399/dna/dna.asp
A Platform for Web Services (DNA and the yet to come DotNet) at http://msdn.microsoft.com/archive/default.asp?url=/archive/en-us/dnarxml/html/websvcs_platform.asp

Additional note on the full name

The official name was Distributed interNet Application Architecture. However when doing a Google search 'Distributed Internet Architecture' came up with more relevant match than 'Distributed Internet Application'.

See http://www.microsoft.com/windows2000/en/server/iis/default.asp?url=/windows2000/en/server/iis/htm/asp/eadg1s9x.htm

Page actively maintained in 2004 by DavidLiu

CategoryArchitecture, CategoryFramework, CategoryMicrosoftTechnology