Frontier 4.1 is shipping at . Here's an overview of the new features in 4.1, full detail is available on the site.

The main priority of Frontier 4.1 was to re-design the user interface to incorporate what we've learned about Frontier over the last four years.

The User's Guide has been completely updated and made current with the feature set of Frontier 4.1.

Frontier's menus have been reorganized to be easier for the first-time user, and more complete for experienced users.

Navigators make finding your way around the object database easier, and supply vital information for the beginning script writer.

Where do I put my script? This was the number one question for new Frontier users. New places include the Workspace table, which is the best place to store personal scripts; the Overnight and Hourly scripts tables store scripts that run every night at 2AM and every hour on the hour; the webServerScripts table stores CGI scripts that run behind WebStar and compatible servers.

Streamlined for AppleScript. Frontier has been able to run AppleScripts since version 3.0. In this release, the features have been streamlined to make the Frontier environment more accessible to AppleScript developers.

New Technology

It's possible to build friendlier and more powerful applications with Frontier 4.1, thanks to several new technologies incorporated for the first time in this release.

MacBird is an GUI authoring tool, MacBird Runtime is baked into the Frontier application. Many of the new ease-of-use features in 4.1 are implemented as MacBird cards.

Thread control. The new thread verbs allow script writers to build more powerful multi-threaded server applications with Frontier. They also complete the verb set needed to run Java code in the Frontier environment.

Object database access from scripts. The new db verbs allow script writers to build systems that store information in multiple root files. This brings the scripting interface into parity with the API supported by our ODB Engine project.

Network OS features. Frontier 4.1 is a more complete network operating system with the inclusion of the new version of the NetFrontier suite.

External editors. In cooperative development with other developers, external applications including BBEdit and Script Debugger can be used to edit text and scripts in Frontier's object database. MacBird supports a similar protocol, allowing the MacBird editor application to edit cards stored in the object database.

Page rendering features. The templates, glossary, macro, and hierarchic website features that were introduced in Frontier 4.0 were refined in 4.1.

There are hundreds of new features and fixes in 4.1, they are detailed on the website.

New standards

We're leading in the design and support of new standards to connect Macintosh applications, especially as they relate to working across the Internet.

Mail agents. In Frontier 4.1, we support the proposed "Mail Agent Protocol", documented on our MIDAS website. This protocol allows electronic mail to flow into databases and search engines; and allows specialized filtering to be implemented by webmasters and system managers.

Menu sharing got an overhaul in 4.1. A new toolkit is available.

Support for other protocols will be released in the form of add-ons to Frontier 4.1. Watch the "News & Updates" page for new releases. Download Frontier 4.1.

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