Situation analysis:
Delivering a new version of its leading-edge EDA software to market in a more
cost-effective and reliable way prompted Mentor Graphics, Inc. to turn to
Mainsoft Corporation when it needed a cross-platform development solution.
Mentor Graphics, based in Wilsonville, Oregon, provides software and services
for building advanced electronic products. Its software enables engineers to
design and build systems and cabling for electronic products in the consumer
electronics, computer, telecommunications, automotive and aerospace industries.
Mentor Graphics's Electronic Design Automation (EDA) software suite facilitates
product development and shortens development cycles.
After acquiring several companies with single platform products,
Mentor Graphics was tasked with the lofty challenge of porting nearly two dozen
diverse products from Windows® to
UNIX®
simultaneously.
With such a large number of software products on both Windows and
UNIX platforms, the cost and technical challenges of developing and supporting
two code bases per product in parallel was growing. Product homogeneity was
also a challenge, as some features were viable on one platform, but not on
others, leaving some customers without important features. In addition, a
competitive marketplace was driving the urgent need for Mentor Graphics to
deliver a new version of its software tools - simultaneously - on both Windows
and UNIX platforms. These new products would better automate the Printed
Circuit Board (PCB) design and production processes used by electrical
engineers.
Decision process:
A Mainsoft competitor was first asked to port one of Mentor Graphics's native
Windows products to UNIX and the newly ported product was shipped to a customer
for evaluation. After Mentor Graphics customer encountered severe problems with
performance and functionality, Mainsoft was consulted and asked to do the same
product port for comparison.
Mentor Graphics's comparison customer trials proved that Mainsoft's application
porting platform was faster and provided a more robust implementation of
Windows technology on UNIX.
Based on the success of the customer trial, Mentor Graphics
decided to port its entire suite of more than 24 PCB products to UNIX using
Mainsoft's application porting platform.
Mainsoft solution:
Mentor Graphics' successful PCB design suite represents a large investment in
software and development resources, so it needed to be confident that any new
technology would work with its existing products and provide a robust and
reliable path for future growth.
Although porting so many products at once was technically
challenging, Mainsoft for UNIX & Linux®
product fully supported the project ís complexities. In writing its original
Windows source code, Mentor Graphics used a number of Microsoft-specific
technologies that are not available in the UNIX environment. For example,
Mentor Graphics makes heavy use of Microsoft's language-independent Component
Object Model (COM) in its applications. Because there was not a compatible
technology on UNIX, Mainsoft for UNIX & Linux helped to bridge this
technical gap by bringing COM support to Solaris, HP-UX, and AIX.
In addition, Mentor Graphics' products use the Microsoft registry, another
technology that does not exist in UNIX. Mainsoft's technology helped bridge
that gap as well. Without Mainsoft for UNIX & Linux, Mentor Graphics would
have had to rewrite large parts of its code for UNIX.
Further, onsite visits by consultants from Mainsoft's Professional
Services division ensured a successful product implementation.
Client Business results:
Mainsoft's single source code solution dramatically shortened the development
cycle for Mentor Graphics. And, with only one code stream to manage, future
development time and effort will be significantly reduced, too.
Technically, the ongoing effort of maintaining a large number of products on
multiple platforms has been dramatically simplified. Mentor Graphics' software
development team can now concentrate on improving and upgrading the product
line, and not be diverted by arduous porting projects.
Most importantly, through their partnership with Mainsoft, Mentor Graphics is
now able to meet its customer demands for one product suite with a consistent
set of functionality across all platforms.
Project summary
Bottom line: Mainsoft helped Mentor Graphics save time and money.
Mentor Graphics transitioned from a development environment that produced
separate code streams for UNIX and Windows platforms, to a more efficient,
costeffective, single Windows source code environment. Using Mainsoft for UNIX
& Linux to seamlessly port Windows source code to UNIX, Mentor Graphics
successfully delivered all the products in its PCB design suite on time. As a
result, the company now benefits from an easier, lower-cost development cycle
year after year. Since the multi-platform PCB design suite first shipped,
Mainsoft for UNIX & Linux has become a standard part of all new development
projects at Mentor Graphics. They have built a track record of success by using
Mainsoft products and will continue to do so now and into the future.
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