New SocketWrench 5.0 Features

If you're a developer who has used previous versions of SocketWrench, or you're a new developer who needs to integrate Internet technology in your applications, SocketWrench offers everything you need to get started. Here's an overview of what's new when you upgrade to SocketWrench 5.0:

  1. SocketWrench 5.0 is fully compatible with Windows Vista and is designed to take advantage of new features introduced in Microsoft's latest operating system. Our developers use Vista and Visual Studio 2005 as their primary development platform, so we don't simply test under Vista, we work with the operating system every day and understand how it impacts application development in the real world. Of course, SocketWrench is also fully supported under Windows XP, Windows Server 2003 and Windows 2000. If your users are upgrading to Vista, then we recommend that you to upgrade to SocketWrench 5.0 to ensure compatibility.
  2. Improved performance and reliability. A new internal memory management system improves how large blocks of memory are allocated and managed, both overall and on a per-client basis. In particular, complex multithreaded applications which create multiple client sessions can see increased performance and use fewer resources over the lifetime of the application.
  3. Enhanced security features. Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) is a new encryption standard that is being widely adopted by the United States government and organizations around the world. SocketWrench 5.0 supports AES on the Windows Vista platform, and enables your application to take advantage of the latest security features without requiring any changes to your applications.
  4. Support for multiple threading models on a per-session basis. Systems with more than one processor are becoming commonplace, and more developers are taking advantage of multithreaded designs in their own applications. SocketWrench 5.0 supports a new "free threading" model which makes it even easier to write complex, multithreaded applications. It can significantly simplify your code and increase the overall performance of your multithreaded applications.
  5. Target multiple frameworks with the SocketWrench .NET Edition. Assemblies for both the version 1.1 and 2.0 frameworks are included in the same product, enabling developers to specifically target which framework they are using to deploy their application. Although most new development today is using Visual Studio 2005, we realize there are still a large number of developers who are creating applications using Visual Studio .NET 2003, and will continue to provide support for both frameworks. Regardless of which version of .NET you're using, the SocketWrench classes have identical interfaces and are completely source-compatible with one another. The .NET 2.0 classes are also fully compatible with the new .NET 3.0 framework, which uses version 2.0 as its base.
  6. Backwards compatibility with SocketWrench 4.0. If you are currently using version 4.0 or 4.5, the current version is source-compatible and will require virtually no changes to your existing code. While new features have been added, the existing class interfaces and APIs remain the same. In most cases, all you will need to do is remove the old version of the control, class or library, replace it with the new version and recompile your application. Because SocketWrench 5.0 is designed to work side-by-side with previous versions, it also means that you can deploy new versions of your software without worrying about "DLL Hell" or other version incompatibilities.
  7. Expanded technical reference documentation. The reference material for SocketWrench is extensive, and in version 5.0 we've worked to make it both easy to understand and comprehensive. Available as both HTML Help and in PDF format, the SocketWrench documentation includes a Developer's Guide to get you up and running quickly, and a Technical Reference that provides extensive documentation for every API function, class method, property and event.
  8. Expanded and updated example code, including examples for both Visual Studio .NET 2003 and Visual Studio 2005. We've reorganized many of the examples included with SocketWrench to make them easier to find, easier to understand and extend for your own use. In addition to new examples for the current version of Visual Studio, we've also retained and updated the examples for Visual Basic 6.0 and Visual C++ 6.0 because we realize that some developers continue to use the older development tools. Additional examples for third-party languages like PowerBASIC have also been included based on customer feedback.

For more information, please review the SocketWrench FAQ in the support section of our website. We also encourage you to download a free evaluation copy of the SocketWrench 5.0 Edition that interests you. The evaluation license is valid for a single development system for 30 days, it is completely functional and can be safely installed side-by-side with earlier versions of SocketWrench.

If you're interested in placing an order, you can use our secure online order form. We offer electronic delivery as an option, so if you place your order during normal business hours, you can be building and redistributing your application the very same day.

If you have any further questions about SocketWrench, please be sure to contact us. We'll do our very best to respond promptly and thoroughly. We also recommend you visit our technical support forums and register there, where you can ask questions and participate in discussions with Catalyst technical support staff and other SocketWrench developers.

SocketWrench Edition

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SocketWrench 5.0
Read about what is new in the latest version of SocketWrench.

SocketWrench Overview
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SocketWrench Features
An overview of the product features and benefits.

SocketWrench Tutorials
Get started using SocketWrench in your application.

Frequently Asked Questions
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Release Notes
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License Agreement
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