DreamFactory expands its support for legacy databases: adds IBM DB2

January 14, 2015 Tim Cox

DreamFactory REST-enables IBM DB2 databases in 10 minutes #enterprise #mobility #appdev #MBAAS

If you're a developer of mobile apps in an enterprise, you're probably extremely busy. In the last year or so, everyone from the marketing team to the HR department wants to access critical information from a mobile phone.

There are a variety of different ways to build those apps: native, HTML5, hybrid. And even more tools to develop the functionality and UI of that front-end app. Actually, that's probably the fun part of the task. Connecting that app to the enterprise databases is much less likely to put a smile on your face, because this task involved messy and complex things like security, authentication and privileges to determine who has access to what.

This is where DreamFactory comes into the picture. Once you install the open-source DreamFactory Services Platform on the cloud of your choice (or on an on-premises server, if you prefer), you have instant access to all the tricky bits of those databases.

DreamFactory has been busy the last couple of years adding to its basic value proposition of "install on any server ➜ connect to any database ➜ develop for any device" by adding support for all the popular front-end tools, all the popular clouds, and all the popular back-end databases.

Today, DreamFactory has added IBM DB2 to the list. Bill Appleton, president of the company, explains why:

"Many enterprises selected IBM DB2 database software for its industry-leading performance, scale, and reliability on a wide choice of platforms — and now they need to make critical enterprise data available on mobile devices. With DreamFactory, these developers get a powerful REST services platform for building mobile apps that leverage DB2 data on the backend. We speed up software development, simplify backend integration and testing when building mobile apps, and provide a robust backend security layer for controlling access to sensitive data stored in DB2."

Here's what a DB2 database looks like, seen through the DreamFactory Services Platform:

Configure a DB2 database as a service in the DreamFactory admin console, and gain instant access to an auto-generated REST API

To get started, simply go to www.dreamfactory.com to sign up for a free developer account or go here to install DreamFactory on the server or IaaS/PaaS platform of your choice.