Our customers have requested the ability to create reports directly from a database and we listened. When we started the design of this new feature, we though: Why stop there? Why not be able to pull data from any database, and link this data with information stored in static XML files or Web Services?

Data within an enterprise can be stored in various formats, including relational databases (which themselves come in a large number of varieties), text files, XML files, Web services, spreadsheets and a variety of proprietary storage methods, each with their own indexing and data access methods. In most enterprises data from multiple sources must be combined in order to obtain a complete data set.

We have implemented a solution that we hope will amaze you with it's simplicity and powerfull results. It has two major components:

Ecrion Data Architect 2010 is an easy to use designer for complex data aggregation processes.
These diagrams can be used at runtime by Ecrion Data Aggregation Server 2010 to gather data from multiple sources and converting it into XML.

With Ecrion Data Aggregation Server 2010, all data within your organization will appear to users as a single homogenous data source. Don't hesitate to download them and send us your feedback; as always, your honest opinions and sugestions are much appreciated!

Ecrion is offering a number of annual bonus promotions until January 22nd. These promotions can provide savings up to $795 per license. To learn more contact Errett Thomas at 1-866-491-6923 or errett.thomas@ecrion.com.

In an effort to keep cost as low as possible effective January 2010 Ecrion will no longer bundle developer licenses with server licenses. However bundled licenses are still available thru January 22nd.

In 2007, as multicore CPUs became widespread, Ecrion started the development of a new formatting engine that will use parallel programming techniques to improve the rendering speed.

The resulted Ultrascale Edition sets the benchmark for high-speed, top of the line processing solutions for XML formatting.

Performance

The new rendering engine is designed to use multiple CPU cores (and or CPUs) to process a single request; this optimization brings a 20% or more improvement in the rendering speed.

A new memory manager optimized for multi thread usage has also been added.

Memory consumption

Because each year we can see an increase in the size and the quantity of the documents processed, we wanted to ensure that we are able to scale with the demand.

A reduced memory consumption algorithm has been implemented and objects are discarded immediately when they are not needed. Following a set of simple rules you will notice that the memory consumption is usually less than 100 Mb.

Bedrock for future improvements

Existing customers can migrate to the new engine without any cost involved. This will bring better compatibility with XSL-FO 1.1, support for PDF forms and rich media and new output formats including Word and Silverlight.

Enterprise Edition users have also the option to upgrade to the Ultrascale Edition when more performance and scalability is needed.