Richard Wiener,
Editor- in-Chief

Welcome to the inaugural issue of the Journal of Object Technology (JOT). We hope that this issue and those to follow will break new ground in providing readers throughout the world with an easily accessible and relevant journal of the highest quality that uses the internet as its medium of publication. We have assembled an Editorial and Advisory Board consisting of distinguished scientists, researchers and practitioners. We shall strive to publish reviewed papers, columns, software reviews and book reviews of the highest quality and relevance.

I wish to thank the many authors who responded quickly to my direct request to submit manuscripts. Based on these submissions, we have put together this issue as well as a portion of the content of the next few issues. We need more submissions as soon as possible so I invite our readership to send me manuscripts (rswiener@acm.org) for consideration that deal with every aspect of object technology both theoretical and practical. We shall feature articles that deal with OO languages, components, OO education and training, OOA, OOD, patterns, OODBMS, methodologies and anything else related to the world of object technology. Your submissions shall be reviewed in a timely manner and published as soon as possible.

I am particularly honored to have columns in this inaugural issue by several members of our Editorial and Advisory Board - columns by Adele Goldberg, Dave Thomas, James Odell and Won Kim (the recent recipient of ACM's Distinguished Service Award). These contributions are personally gratifying because of the early support that these same people provided me in 1988 when another publication that many of you are familiar with was founded. I welcome the series of columns on type classification being contributed by Anthony Simons from Sheffield University. Other new columns shall be added in forthcoming issues of JOT.

I wish to acknowledge the help and support of the ETH and the publisher Dr. Bertrand Meyer. I am deeply honored to have been invited by him to serve as the Editor-in-Chief of JOT. Bertrand's seminal contributions and his significant and positive impact on our field are well known. I look forward to his future contributions not only as publisher but also as contributor. I wish to also thank Ruth Bürkli, JOT's Editorial Assistant, for her tireless and creative work in managing the design and implementation of the pages that you are reading.

The four reviewed feature-length papers that are included in this issue reflect the breadth and depth of what you can expect in future issues of JOT. I believe that you shall find these articles interesting and useful.

I look forward to receiving your letters and articles for publication in future issues of this journal. Thanks in advance for your support.