Can JChem support this usage scenario?

Hello,

We are currently evaluating various chemical information storage systems on behalf of a chemical products manufacturer and distributor and are considering purchasing JChem Base. Before we commit to making a purchase, we need to make sure that it will meet our needs. We've reviewed quite a bit of the detailed and very thorough documentation relating to JChem Base, but we would like an assurance that we are making the right decision with regard to purchasing JChem Base and are not making any incorrect assumptions.

Some background information:

• Our client has approximately 7,000 chemical records.


• The JChem system will be operated by chemical experts using a rich GUI environment.


• Product-specific information such as pricing, inventory, etc. will be stored in a database external to JChem.


• Products will be advertised via web, print, and CD-ROM catalog.


• We would prefer that most of our client's IT infrastructure be hosted at an off-site third-party managed hosting location.


• JChem's primary role in our client's system will be to generate images of chemical symbols and provide a web- and CD-ROM-accessible searchable chemical symbol database.

Specific questions:

1. Our ideal usage scenario is to install the core JChem Base server components on a physical server machine and then have individual users access it using a rich GUI interface on various personal workstations. Is this feasible? Would JChem Base perform efficiently if the server component was hosted off-site, or would you recommend that JChem Base be hosted on the local LAN? If such off-site hosting is available, is there some kind of authentication method that would prevent malicious users from connecting to and accessing JChem Base information?


2. Can JChem be configured to perform an on-demand "batch export" of chemical symbol data? Would such configuration require Java or .NET programming, or is it built in?


3. How commonly do users install JChem Base server components on Linux (specifically, Red Hat-derived) operating systems? Does this work well? Are ChemAxon developers able to provide support for Linux installations?


4. How much work does it take to integrate a chemical symbol search facility into a web application? Is such a chemical symbol search facility easy to customize with regard to layout, style, and general look and feel?


5. Can such a chemical symbol search facility be customized to pull in product information from a different source entirely? In other words, can the result of a search of this kind be augmented with information about pricing, inventory, quantities, etc. pulled in from a different data repository? Could such a search result be customized to link to an order form? Would it be necessary to write JChem Base server-side Java or .NET code to accomplish this, or could all of this be executed on the webserver via a web scripting language and/or via browser-side JavaScript?

Thank you for your help with this issue.

-John David

 

johndavid wrote:

Our ideal usage scenario is to install the core JChem Base server components on a physical server machine and then have individual users access it using a rich GUI interface on various personal workstations. Is this feasible?

Yes. Jchem Base contains APIs (Java and .NET) which can be used in a client-server application.

 

Would JChem Base perform efficiently if the server component was hosted off-site, or would you recommend that JChem Base be hosted on the local LAN?

For 7 thousand molecules it must be very efficient. Above hundreds of thousands or millions of structures you could start to think about a middle-tier or a Cartridge usage or locating near to the database store, but for this small scale there will be no performance issues.

 

If such off-site hosting is available, is there some kind of authentication method that would prevent malicious users from connecting to and accessing JChem Base information?

Yes. The easiest is to use the authentication method of the relational database connection. You could ask for the username and password in your program that will be passed over to JDBC. See:

http://www.chemaxon.com/jchem/doc/admin/#connect

http://www.chemaxon.com/jchem/doc/api/chemaxon/util/ConnectionHandler.html

 

Can JChem be configured to perform an on-demand "batch export" of chemical symbol data? Would such configuration require Java or .NET programming, or is it built in?

 

Batch export is available in various ways:

JChem Manager: http://www.chemaxon.com/jchem/doc/admin/#export

Instant JChem: http://www.chemaxon.com/instantjchem/ijc_latest/docs/user/help/htmlfiles/moving_data/exporting_data.html

And also in the example web applications. (See below.)

When programming, the Exporter class can be used:
http://www.chemaxon.com/jchem/doc/api/chemaxon/jchem/db/Exporter.html

 

How commonly do users install JChem Base server components on Linux (specifically, Red Hat-derived) operating systems? Does this work well? Are ChemAxon developers able to provide support for Linux installations?

JChem Base is a Java based software tool, and totally platform
independent. Naturally we can provide support for the Linux installations. Linux installations work well at many clients.

 

How much work does it take to integrate a chemical symbol search facility into a web application? Is such a chemical symbol search facility easy to customize with regard to layout, style, and general look and feel?

 

We created some web based examples, you can find them in the examples
folder in the JChem distribution or on the ChemAxon site:
http://chemaxon.com/jchem/examples.html

The source of those examples are open, you can use them freely for develop
an own web client for JChem Base. You can create web application for
JChem Base with only Java or .NET based technologies. (Servlet or JSP, ASP.NET, etc.)
If you want to use other technologies I recommend to use the JChem Web
Services. Our
Ajax example is a client application for JChem Web Services and it uses
just HTML and Javascript so it is very easy to customize. The Ajax example is open source as well.

 

Can such a chemical symbol search facility be customized to pull in product information from a different source entirely? In other words, can the result of a search of this kind be augmented with information about pricing, inventory, quantities, etc. pulled in from a different data repository?

Yes, chemical and non-chemical searches can be combined. See:

http://www.chemaxon.com/jchem/doc/guide/search/index.html#sss_combine

 

Could such a search result be customized to link to an order form?

Certainly, but it has to be implemented in your application.

 

Would it be necessary to write JChem Base server-side Java or .NET code to accomplish this, or could all of this be executed on the webserver via a web scripting language and/or via browser-side JavaScript?

If you are using JChem Web Services, I think any screening language will do. See the AJAX example and the documentation for more details:

http://www.chemaxon.com/webservices/developersGuide.html

 

Let us know if you need any further information.

 

Best regards,

Szabolcs