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The classic example is the transaction manager, a component that is interposed betweeen client users and the application or "back end" database in OLTP or client/server computing. In these situations, middleware acclerates client requests by reducing the number of resource-expensive connections that must be made, and by making each connection as efficient as possible. Examples of such transaction-focused middleware include:

Another reason for middleware is to centrally provide high-level abstractions and services to applications, to ease application programming, application integration, and system management tasks. Over the years, middleware has evolved from its intial limited focus on the efficiency of transaction management, and this bigger role.

Middleware is now used to describe database management systems, web servers, application servers, content management systems, and similar tools that support the application development and delivery process. Middleware is especially integral to modern information based on XML, SOAP,

In addition to the existing vendors updating their wares to address the newly expanded vision, vendors such as Mercator, Vitria, and Webmethods were specifically founded to to provide Web-oriented middleware tools. Industry groups such as the Apache Software Foundation and the ObjectWeb consortium encourage the development of open sourceNote: "open source" in the intelligence community simply means "any information accessible to the public, possibly after paying a fee". This article is about open source software, a more common meaning for the term "open source". Open source or open sourc middleware.

The term middleware is often considered a buzzwordA buzzword (also known as a fashion word is an idiom, often a neologism, commonly used in technical, administrative and political environments, consisting of an over-used word or phrase. Buzzwords appear ubiquitously but their actual meanings often remain.

See also: Game engine middlewareIn computing, a game engine is the core software component of a computer game. It typically handles rendering and other necessary technology, but might also handle additional tasks such as game AI, collision detection between game objects, etc. The most c