Northgate Information Solutions is pleased to announce the
availability of Reality V14.0

Following on from previous releases Reality continues to be enhanced
and Reality V14.0 again delivers greater benefits in the areas of:


Connectivity

Integration

Resilience

Productivity

MultiValue Migration


By delivering new functionality in the following area's:

Safe & Secure

Data Encryption at Rest
Enhanced Disaster Recovery - RealityDR

Interoperability

English generated Web Pages
Improved ActiveX Interface enabling '.NET' integration

Performance

Configurable Database internal frame size
Real-time auto File Sizing
Non-fragmenting multi-stream Account Restore
Increased Transaction Log sizes

MultiValue Compatibility

Simulates other MV platforms
Enhanced DataBasic functionality

Reality Environment

ANALYZE "user process" command
New TCL Logger
Optionally exclude files from transaction boundaries
Additional platform support


Safe & Secure

Data Encryption at Rest

Reality has addressed the secure data concerns with its new 'Data
Encryption at Rest' feature. This refers to all data stored in
computer storage, both for on-line access and off-line data archiving.
Reality V14.0 offers several new encryption components to meet these
needs which are summarised below.

Fully Encrypted Files

When a file is created it can be identified as encrypted with access
determined within a user's profile. All data types (including binary)
will be encrypted when written and decrypted when read back, with this
being transparent to the user or underlying application.

Encrypted Data in Reality Indexes

Any indexes that refer to encrypted data are themselves encrypted to
ensure that the data remains hidden to unauthorised access.

Save/Restore of Encrypted Files

Reality's utilities save all items 'as is', any encrypted data will
not be decrypted prior to writing to media, similarly restore
utilities restore data 'as is', any encrypted data will remain
encrypted.

Encrypted Data on Portable Media

All Reality tape devices and images allow for an encryption option
which causes data written to use a specified key for data export. The
data can only be decrypted and read with access to this key, thus
allowing it to be transported and stored securely.

Enhanced DataBasic ENCRYPT and DECRYPT

Enhanced versions of the existing DataBasic commands allow the use of
the new encryption feature.

Secure Management of Encryption Keys

Data Encryption is based on keys that encrypt and decrypt data. These
user defined keys are held securely within Reality and are referenced
by name within a user's profile. Utilities are provided to securely
manage and archive encryption keys, with DES (Data Encryption
Standard), CBC (Cipher Block Chaining) and triple-DES currently
supported.

Enhanced Disaster Recovery - RealityDR

Reality V14.0 Disaster Recovery (DR) capability provides an unattended
mechanism for synchronising standalone or Failsafe Databases to a
separate remote System. Significantly, this can operate over a slow or
intermittent communications link. RealityDR is fully integrated into
the resilience management utilities, simplifying the configuration and
day-to-day tasks.
Key Features include:

Auto starts from System boot
Unattended operation
Auto recovery from network interruptions
Continuous synchronisation up to the last completed transaction
Operates over a slow or intermittent network
Simple to use configuration utility

Interoperability

English generated Web Pages

Reality V14.0 can generate HTML Web Pages directly from English
without the need for programmer or third party product intervention,
enabling greater efficiencies for business reporting.

New ActiveX Interface

The ActiveX interface delivered with Reality V14.0 enables Windows
applications written in environments such as .NET, 'C', VBA and Visual
Basic to efficiently call individual DataBasic subroutines remotely.

Performance

Configurable Database Frame Size

Reality V14.0 now supports frame sizes of (1, 2, 4 or 8 KB) to achieve
optimum application performance. Statistics are generated to assist
choosing the frame size required.

Auto File Sizing

Auto File Sizing is now set by default to deliver optimal performance
with no administrative overhead.

Multi-stream Account Restore

The multi-stream restore process has been optimised to reduce disk
fragmentation, thus significantly improving the performance of the
restored database.

Increased Transaction Log Sizes

Reality V14.0 increases each individual transaction log size from 2GB
to 200GB or 4 billion individual transactions, whichever occurs first
- thus reducing the total cost of ownership.

MultiValue Compatibility

Reality V14.0 further simplifies and eases migration from other MV
platform environments:

Simulate MV platforms

Options and definable MV Environment configurations can change the
behaviour of English, DataBasic, TCL, Proc and other runtime areas
New TCL stacker which is capable of emulating other MV environments

Key DataBasic Enhancements

DataBasic EQU to statements
DataBasic functions and statements - RAISE, LOWER, SORT, COMPARE,
PAUSE and WAKE
Improved error handling within the DataBasic compiler
..... Plus numerous other enhancements

Reality Environment

ANALYZE "user process" Command

Key information about a user process can now be presented together;
e.g. System and DataBasic run status, return stacks and lock
contention.

New TCL Logger

Reality V14.0 satisfies the new demands in security auditing and
support capabilities. This new feature logs user activity across the
System enabling:

Logging and monitoring of user activity at TCL
View or run all user TCL history, including program invoked commands

Advanced HTML User Documentation

Viewable from the Reality CD image or installed on any File or Web
Server, including the built in mini Web Server.

Further enquiries on Reality can be made via www.northgate-is.com/reality
or reality (AT) northgate-is (DOT) com

Visit www.northgate-is.com/reality for more information on Reality, or
to request a free evaluation.