StrikeIron Offers Free Marketplace Edition of OnDemand for Microsoft Excel Add-in
Drag-and-drop solution integrates StrikeIron Marketplace Web services directly into Microsoft Excel creating “live” workbooks
Research Triangle Park, NC -- April 11, 2006 -- StrikeIron Inc. today announced a free “marketplace edition” of StrikeIron OnDemand for Web Services. This free edition enables unlimited access within Excel to all of the Web services from the StrikeIron Web Services Marketplace.
StrikeIron OnDemand for Excel provides Microsoft Excel users drag-and-drop access to the power of XML-based Web services, delivering “live” workbooks to the desktop that are fed by real-time data. Now, any subscriber or trial-user of one or more Web services from StrikeIron’s Web Services Marketplace can build rich-client spreadsheets that incorporate live data feeds from multiple sources. A licensed “professional version” enables the same drag-and-drop access to any Web service, turning Excel into a rich, universal client for service-oriented architectures and a tool for building composite, services-driven applications.
Once a Web service has been dropped into Excel, any standard Excel calculation or function can then be applied to the resulting output data from that Web service, which in turn can be designated as input data to another Web service. In addition, Web services can be refreshed individually, all at once, at timed intervals, or in a specific order. For security purposes, StrikeIron has included an automatic Invisible Link option to hide access to live data upon closing a workbook to prevent viewing by unauthorized users.
StrikeIron has created over 30 Sample Workbooks that utilize the various Web services available from StrikeIron’s Web Services Marketplace. These workbooks are solutions as is and also demonstrate the kinds of rich-client, services-driven applications that can be created using this plug-in. Downloads are available at http://www.strikeiron.com/tools/tools_ondemand.aspx.
“People have talked about Microsoft Excel as a rich client for Web 2.0, service-oriented applications, and any other live data sources for quite some time. This is where the rubber hits the road.” said Bob Brauer, CEO and President of StrikeIron. “OnDemand for Excel provides organizations with the solution they need to rapidly create business applications that bring real-time data from many different sources to the desktop, completely customizable within Excel, and without any required programming.”
The StrikeIron Web Services Marketplace allows users to easily enhance the capabilities and value of service oriented architecture (SOA) deployments, increase ROI with CRM investments, improve data quality and data value, and expand the functionality of e-commerce applications by integrating real-time external customer, company, and government data. Examples include real-time address verification, e-mail verification, 24-hour accurate reverse phone lookup, an executive decision-makers database, state and local tax rates, global SMS capabilities, residential and business data enhancement lookups and much more.
About StrikeIron
StrikeIron is the leader in the commercialization of Web Services, providing the world's largest library of externally available plug-and-play Web services. Built on top of a sophisticated, yet easy-to-use Web Services Commerce Platform, the Marketplace serves as a place for providers and consumers of XML-based Web services to publish, subscribe to, and build applications and Web sites using a diverse set of Web services.
Enabling a business model for the Programmable Web, the core technology provides self-service publishing and consumption of Web services, micro-transactions and usage-based billing, software infrastructure, multiple productivity tools, seamless integration for both individual customers and software technology partners, and a consistency of usage from multiple Web services across multiple vendors. For more information, visit http://www.strikeiron.com.