- Network data engines - Object-oriented architectures - Advanced modeling and simulation - Machine intelligence - Automatic target recognition - Computer-aided software engineering (CASE) tools Network technologies are just now emerging but are being driven at a frenzied pace in the commercial marketplace. A variety of advanced tools beyond "hot link" browsing are being introduced daily. Data browsers, brokers, gatherers, and network repositories are being released, as demonstrated by products like _Harvester_ and _Netscape's Catalog Server_. Platform independent languages such as JAVA and their associated virtual computational engines promise the same network flexibility for programs that is now enjoyed by data. Perhaps the most important area of technology development for Rapid Dominance is the development of practical object-oriented architectures and protocols. Protocols such as CORBA, OLE, ALSP, HLA and DIS[1] are changing the face of computing, making it much easier to link programs and databases, and access and correlate information that was previously "entombed" within its legacy application. [Footnote 1: CORBA (common object request broker architecture), OLE (object linking and embedding), ALSP (aggregate level simulation protocol), HLA (high-level architecture), DIS (Distributed Interactive Simulation). These are all protocols or the architectures defining protocols that, in part, enable disparate software and/or hardware components to be linked or otherwise share information and logical elements.] One interesting application area migrating toward an object-oriented approach is geospatial databases. In the past, geospatial data were stored as either raster-based or vector information, and significant processing was required for users to make queries regarding roads, areas, or objects such as building sites. A new approach, called a spatial database engine, creates intuitive objects from standard geospatial databases and uses commercial databases to add attributes to the objects. This is a very powerful technique that allows geospatial data, a key element of warfighting, to be managed quickly and efficiently using commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) software. It is particularly useful for distributed databases such as one would find on a network.