Linoma Introduces MFT Software for External Exchanges

September 1, 2009 Alex Woodie

Linoma Software last week unveiled GoAnywhere Services, a new addition to its flagship managed file transfer (MFT) software designed to make it easier for organizations to exchange data externally with their partners and customers. GoAnywhere Services, which runs under i OS, also introduces a new Web client that can create a defacto data storefront for external communications.

Linoma is no newbie to the MFT business. While the Nebraska company has been marketing its GoAnywhere product line under the header of “MFT product” for a short time, that’s more a result of the relative newness of the MFT product category and the realization of the many benefits that an MFT product can bring (see “Managed File Transfer: A New Product Category That’s Here to Stay” elsewhere in this newsletter) than a statement of what Linoma has been up to.

GoAnywhere was officially launched about 18 months ago as the follow-on to Linoma’s TransferAnywhere tool, which itself had been around for several years. As an MFT tool that runs natively on a number of platforms (including i OS and z/OS), GoAnywhere distributes files using an array of protocols (FTP, FTPS, SFTP, HTTP, HTTPS, SMTP, POP3, and IMAP); provides direct database connectivity for DB2/400, DB2 UDB, Oracle, SQL Server, MySQL, and Informix; and offers users the choice of Open PGP, SSL, AES, and ZIP encryption capabilities. It also automatically performs file conversions, queues jobs for execution on servers, and keeps an audit trail of all activities.

Now, with the launch of GoAnywhere Services, Linoma is shaking up its GoAnywhere lineup just a bit, and branching out slightly. For starters, Linoma has renamed the original GoAnywhere product as GoAnywhere Director. Its role becomes focused on providing enterprise-strength MFT capabilities.

Compared to GoAnywhere Director, GoAnywhere Services is less expensive and less complicated. It lacks some of the features of GoAnywhere Director, including the PGP and AES encryption, the file conversion capability, and the capability to do direct database connections. Most of the other core features, such as the capability to trigger events and logging, remain in place.

Potentially the most compelling new feature with GoAnywhere Services is a new Web client that allows external parties to use the Web to upload and download files to and from an organization that bought GoAnywhere Services. Parties that utilize this Web client don’t need to install any software to exchange data securely with a trading partner.

The primary difference between the two products is this: GoAnywhere Services allows external parties to initiate data exchanges with the company that licensed the product, whereas GoAnywhere Director is primarily used where the customer itself initiates the transaction with its customers or partners, explains Linoma president Bob Luebbe.

“The GoAnywhere Services product allows your trading partner to connect back to you,” Luebbe says. “Let’s say you have a customer that needs to connect up to you once a week to pull some files, some price sheets or whatever. They can initiate the conversation back to your system, and they could connect through FTP or SFTP [or other protocols]. We also have this Web client where they can just fire up their browser and upload and download files.”

Luebbe likens GoAnywhere Services to a “data storefront.” “You want some data, you can come to these services, and you can upload data to us, or pull data down from us,” he says. “It’s like your data store front, per se, to your customers and vendors.”

GoAnywhere Services, like GoAnywhere Director, runs on i OS, Windows, Linux, AIX, and Solaris platforms. Linoma has also been working with IBM on certifying its GoAnywhere products on IBM’s z/OS mainframe operating system. Pricing starts at $2,995.

Linoma also delivered a new white paper titled “Beyond FTP: Securing and Managing File Transfers.” The white paper can be downloaded at Linoma’s Web site at www.linoma.com or at its new GoAnywhere product Web site at www.goanywheremft.com.