The latest version of Hornbill's flagship technology platform Supportworks ESP v7.4 has been released. As well as visible improvement to the product's look and feel, the new platform release brings usability and performance improvements to users of all Supportworks service desk applications. Following market demand for ITIL process software, the default application installed out of the box has been upgraded to Hornbill's ITSM Foundations solution, offering support for entry-level ITIL processes, external multi-organization and departmental support, contracts, customer profiles and a SLA matrix.

This release also includes many under-the-hood enhancements that enable more comprehensive service desk application potential. These are mainly driven by the new features and capability requirements of the upcoming Supportworks ITSM Enterprise v3.0, recently certified PinkVERIFY™ 3.0 for eleven processes and due for release Q2 2010.

A technology preview of a new zero-install Web 2.0 browser based client also features, currently under development in conjunction with feedback from Hornbill's user community, with the aim to emulate the functionality and experience of the client desktop. For security and consistency, system administration, system design and developer functions remain available in the rich client only. Notably, under the new web client technology 100% of the rich client custom forms' capability, including any custom JavaScript code, is fully functional within the web browser: any changes made in the design environment for the rich client are immediately available in the new web client.

Another key addition is a brand new browser-based documentation portal for the platform as well as all applications, replacing several electronic formats. A single, easy to navigate documentation portal allows semantic and keyword searches to be performed across all documents at the same time with ranked results grouped by individual documents. All user, administration, customization and development reference documentation is now provided in one central place.

Hornbill expanded its development activities during 2009 and placed all future development and quality activities under a structured CMMI development process. Supportworks ESP v7.4 is the first version of its platform technology to be developed and released under a new organizational structure which sees platform and application development teams focused on their respective areas.

Gerry Sweeney, Founder and CTO of Hornbill Technologies said: "This is an important milestone for Hornbill, being the first software release under our new development structure and enterprise-class quality regime. Supportworks v7.4 is a great looking product with outstanding features. This release has been through a most rigorous quality cycle and the result is something we are very proud to be able to deliver to our customers, solution partners and developer community. Supportworks v7.4 sets the standard for a number of other exciting technology-related projects underway here at Hornbill which we will be announcing over the coming months."