Monday 2nd December 1996

TransCom Software Inc.

TransCom Software & WaveTools

TransCom Software are now nearing the completion of the "WaveTools" Version 1 beta series. This has been a long time in development because our main objective was to squeeze the most out of Delphi and TCP/IP programming. The feedback we have received from the hundreds of Beta testers has helped to evolve the WaveTools into what many now believe to be the most powerful TCP/IP development tool available today.

TransCom is a young but progressive and innovative company, developing TCP/IP based tools and software. "WaveTools" is the first of many key development tools to be released. We plan to ship the first commercial versions through established development software distributors from December with a WaveTools Pro version available in the new year.

WaveTools 32

The "WaveTools 32" are a Delphi 2.0 component set (DCU’s) which will enable the developer to develop Internet applications such as the classic browser. The components conform to the current HTML 3+ standards and support both Netscape and Microsoft browser standards and features (as well as the capability to automatically emulate them). The "WaveTools" enable a developer to build as much functionality as is required by the user or company without providing excessive support for features which will never be required and only serve to complicate the use of the developed software. The strength of current leading browser programs is the support for "helpers" or "Plug-ins". These will also be supported by "WaveTools" (32 bit version only) which ensures users use all the new features available on the Internet without fear of being left out.

The tools enable the developer to build a single EXE file without the use of DLL’s, OCX’s or VBX’s. This enables a simple and clean installation of the developed software without having to install and register these various support files throughout the users system. It also means that the software developed with "WaveTools" provides small, fast and easily manageable 32 and 16 bit applications. However, since we really believe in the superior capabilities of these tools, we will also embrace the OCX components market and future plans also include MFC compliant classes.

WaveTools 16

Although the first version of "WaveTools" is 32 bit, we have been working to port the 32 bit code back into 16 bit code. This has for the most part been quite simple due to very few API calls and 32 bit specific code. All code now developed is both 32 bit and 16 bit compilable so expect the 16 bit beta shortly, very shortly after the final 32 bit beta. We are currently testing the 16 bit version internally with great success.

Developers of both 16 and 32 bit WaveTools based applications will find that the two versions are virtually identical so if written carefully, the same program code can be used with either the 16 or 32 bit WaveTools controls without modification.

Component Features

A brief outline of the WaveTools features current and almost complete include the following while a more complete list is available on the Component features page.

Web - Http component

• Full implementation of HTTP 1.1 standard
• Automatic document redirection handling
• Up to 200 connections at the same time
• Automatic document caching (memory and disk based)
• DNS caching
• Can emulate every browser in the market
• Support for content negotiation
• Full support for MIME types
• URL pass through for Ftp, Gopher and Wais
• Full support for authorisation and challenging (basic scheme only)
• Automatic proxy and no-proxy handling
• Full support for automatic streaming (disk and memory)
• The ONLY winsock implementation which lets you treat remote documents as disk-based files !!!!
• Enhanced support for on request and unsolicited data handling
• Programmable buffer size
• Enhanced method handling to avoid stack problems with re-entrant code.
• Off-line browsing capabilities (when connected to a cache)
  

WebBrowser - Simply Netscape in a Component! What more is there to say?

• Support for all HTML 3+ tags
• Easily and fully customisable
• *Support for language extensions
• *Support for user-defined processing of specific HTML tags
• Enhanced streamlined-stacks based processing for speed
• Full support for frames
• Easily and fully customisable
• Fast redrawing
• *Progressive processing and display
• *Support for user-defined drawing operation
• **Support for Netscape plug-ins and ActiveX
• **Support for Java
• * In the maintenance release due in the first three weeks of December
• ** In the Pro version due in January 1997 and 32 bits only

WebImage - image downloading and decompression

• Decompress all GIF and JPEG images
• Support for maps and client-side image mapping
• Progressive displaying and decompression
• Automatic palette reduction, dithering and realisation
• Support for only loading-and-decompressing operations
• Full access to drawing surface
• Automatic stretching of image to adapt to user defined size
• Full JFIF compliant
• Full GIF 87 and 89 compliant
• The one and only Jpeg component made of 100% Delphi code, no external DLLs or linked C code

WebIndicator - picture framer

• Easily create your own ‘Netscape-style’ animation on your toolbar
• Automatic activation and de-activation when connected to a TWebBrowser component

WebNavigator - navigation bar

• Supports up to nine ‘Internet Explorer-like’ buttons.
• Up to 6 user buttons that can be customised via Object Inspector or HTML tags inside the document
• Control every aspect of the TWebBrowser component

WebPrinter - printer control

• Control and monitor all functions of a connected printer
• Provides the capability to save the page to disk for easy display in other programs (WMF compliant files) or print directly to assigned printer.
• Can display and print up to 9 thumbnails on a single page
• User definable: paper size, number of copies, margins and orientation

WebPreview - print preview control

• Connects to a WebPrinter object to easily display a print preview of HTML documents on the screen
• User definable zoom and orientation
• Automatic page fitting (width only or both orientation)

Further information

For further details and information missing from this site, please email us at wavetools@transerve.com

Copyright © 1996 TransCom Software Inc.

The Athena image and Delphi are trademarks of
Borland International, Inc., used with permission.