Ashton-Tate had been promising a new version of the core dBASE product line starting around 1986. The new version was going to be more powerful, faster, and easier to create databases with. It would have improved indexes and networking, support SQL internally as well as interacting with SQL Server, and include a compiler. Ashton-Tate announced dBASE IV in February 1988 with an anticipated release set for July of that year. dBASE IV was eventually released in October 1988 as two products: Standard and Developer's editions.