Eiffel Software Announces Release of EiffelStudio 5.4 for Linux

Productivity Tool Keeps Increasing Performance

Santa Barbara, California - (November 17, 2003) - Eiffel Software today announced the production release of EiffelStudio 5.4, the latest version of its award-winning development environment, for the Linux platform.

EiffelStudio is the cornerstone of the Eiffel Development FrameworkTM, a simple and powerful system for developing record breaking applications at a fraction of the cost of other languages and tools.

EiffelStudio is based on the well-planned programming language, Eiffel. Backed by the efficiency of the language and the powerful tools in the environment, EiffelStudio's users continuously produce 2 to 10 times as much quality software in the same amount of time as can be achieved using other languages and toolsets. Eiffel has thus gained prominence over the years amongst developers and design team leaders in challenging enterprise environments in the financial, manufacturing, and government sectors.

"Software is a crucial element when cutting company costs and EiffelStudio is the ideal tool to realize those savings" said Lawrence Miller, Director of Customer Relations for Eiffel Software. "Because of Eiffel's plain English syntax and unique Design by Contract TM mechanism, each developer is able to write and maintain up to one million lines of code, reducing companies bottom line ROI and empowering savvy business leaders to advance their organizations".

EiffelStudio 5.4 is the best way to create robust, extendible and reusable objects and libraries on Linux. Eiffel's Design by ContractTM mechanism makes it especially easy to prevent a variety of bugs. Robust code is easier to test, maintain and reuse.

Enhancements of EiffelStudio 5.4 include:

* Increased compiler speed
* Improved support for multithreading
* Major Improvements to EiffelBuild, the GUI Builder, including:
- Support for multiple windows and dialogs, which may be controlled and placed into subdirectories, through the use of the new "Window Selector" tool
- Support for definitions of string, integer and pixmap constants which may be used within the EiffelBuild user interface, and are generated into a constants class for your project
* Better conformance to the ongoing standardization process of Eiffel
through ECMA
* Added first support for new convert keyword
* Improved speed of agent calls by a factor of 2 to 3
* Support for runtime checked preconditions and post conditions on
external routines
* Support for effecting a deferred routine by an external one
and vice versa

According to Eiffel users, the Eiffel language is among the easiest to learn. Passive support for users new to the language is available from the company website together with links to other Eiffel user groups worldwide.

Availability:
The new release of EiffelStudio has already begun shipping to Eiffel Software's customers under maintenance, and is available immediately via the company's website, www.eiffel.com. Onsite training and consulting are also available from the company by inquiring at sales@eiffel.com. Eiffel Software is a leading provider of Eiffel pure object-oriented programming tools. Founded in 1985, Eiffel Software produces proven tools and component libraries for business-critical and enterprise software developments. Eiffel Software's products enable their customers to output more and higher-quality software in less time than with any other development tools. Its users span the globe, in industries ranging from large financial institutions, technology manufacturing, government and defense contractors, to health care providers and more.