C# and CLI Become More Powerful - Ecma Improves the Existing Standards for C# and CLI by Publishing the Third Edition
Geneva (ots)
In June 2005 the Ecma General Assembly approved the third edition of the standards for C# and CLI. With the first edition of the standards in 2002 and their adoption by ISO/IEC in 2003, the industry was given powerful tools to enable vendor-neutral development of Web services. Today, Ecma is keeping pace with the growing needs of the developer community by publishing the third edition.
New core features - The object-oriented programming language C# allows developers to easily build XML-based Web services with any language and on any platform. With the third edition, the standard has been substantially improved. It contains several new core features such as generics, nullable types and anonymous methods, which can simplify event handling.
More productive - At the same time, Ecma has improved the standard for CLI, in which applications written in multiple high-level languages can be executed in different system environments. The standard now includes first-class support for generics at both run-time and class level. Besides, a parallel Application Programming Interface (API) allows developers to more easily develop code to simultaneously run on multiple threads.
"Intel is committed to fostering open standards. Ecma's ratification of the CLI specification is proof that cooperation between companies, universities and individuals can produce a quality product," said Wen-Hann Wang, general manager of Intel's Managed Run-Time Division. "An open CLI standard helps encourage research and enablement to ensure the success of managed applications on standard computing platforms."
David Patrick, Novell's general manager of Linux, open source and platform services commented: "We are very pleased with the upgrades to the Ecma C# language specification as they show the evolution of a language which is adapting to the needs of modern applications."
"Ecma's endorsement of the latest version of C# and CLI reaffirms Microsoft's ongoing commitment to open standards," said Anders Hejlsberg, distinguished engineer at Microsoft Corporation. "Microsoft is excited about making the advances in C# broadly available through Ecma standardization."
Dr. Nigel Perry, computer scientist, New Zealand, and convener of the Ecma C# technical committee commented: "C# is a standardized modern object-oriented language which is available across multiple platforms; complete releases for Windows, Linux and MacOS X are all expected by the end of this year, making it very attractive for both commercial projects and teaching."
"Ecma members have produced a quality, cohesive specification from a multitude of draft technologies, allowing for a more robust managed code experience," said Joel Marcey, Ecma CLI technical group convener and Intel software engineer.
About Ecma International
Since its inception in 1961, Ecma International (Ecma) has developed standards for Information and Communication Technology (ICT) and Consumer Electronics (CE). Ecma is a non-profit industry association of technology developers, vendors and users. Industry and other experts work together at Ecma to complete standards. Ecma submits its work for approval as ISO, ISO/IEC and ETSI standards and is the inventor and main practitioner of "fast tracking" of specifications through the standardisation process in global standards bodies such as the ISO. Publications can be downloaded free of charge from http://www.ecma-international.org/.
Contact:
Jan W. van den Beld
Ecma International
CH-1204 Geneva
Tel. +41/22/849'60'00
Fax +41/22/849'60'01
Internet: http://www.ecma-international.org/