Front-end tools -- Which is the most productive?

[http://vmdd.tech.mylinuxisp.com/catalog/]

After having seen my co-worker reinventing the wheel
when he busily labored to build MS Access framework, I want to share
my perspective.

Having experienced with Access, Visual Basic, Visual C++,
and PowerBuilder, I think Sybase's PowerBuilder is the most
productive tool to build front-ends for any database or
client/server applications. PowerBuilder's datawindow
is very powerful.

Binh

http://vmdd.tech.mylinuxisp.com/catalog/

[Steve Jorgensen]

Re: Front-end tools -- Which is the most productive?

On 22 Sep 2004 21:53:19 -0700, binhph@gmail.co m
(http://vmdd.tech.mylinuxisp.com/catalog/) wrote:
[color=blue]
>After having seen my co-worker reinventing the wheel
>when he busily labored to build MS Access framework, I want to share
>my perspective.
>
>Having experienced with Access, Visual Basic, Visual C++,
>and PowerBuilder, I think Sybase's PowerBuilder is the most
>productive tool to build front-ends for any database or
>client/server applications. PowerBuilder's datawindow
>is very powerful.
>
>Binh
>http://vmdd.tech.mylinuxisp.com/catalog/[/color]

You phrase this as a question, but yit reads more like thinly veiled Spam.

I do some contract work with a company that started their business doing
powerbuilder work, and the don't do any new projects in it now that other
products are more mature. From what they tell me, Powerbuilder is nice, but
it's also somewhat unstable, and its programming model is hard to internalize,
so you'll generally get pretty poor Powerbuilder code from anyone who is not a
combat tested Powerbuilder expert.

I do think it's pretty cool that the Powerbuilder DataWindow will (supposedly)
soon be available as a full-fledged .NET component (I understand it's
currently a wrapper around the old COM implementation) . .NET with a good
implementation of the DataWindow would be pretty potent.

[Tony Toews]

Re: Front-end tools -- Which is the most productive?

Steve Jorgensen <nospam@nospam. nospam> wrote:
[color=blue]
>its programming model is hard to internalize,
>so you'll generally get pretty poor Powerbuilder code from anyone who is not a
>combat tested Powerbuilder expert.[/color]

What does "hard to internalize" mean?

Tony
--
Tony Toews, Microsoft Access MVP
Please respond only in the newsgroups so that others can
read the entire thread of messages.
Microsoft Access Links, Hints, Tips & Accounting Systems at

http://www.granite.ab.ca/accsmstr.htm

[rkc]

Re: Front-end tools -- Which is the most productive?


"Tony Toews" <ttoews@teluspl anet.net> wrote in message
news:r5i6l0lmtk h5hqrnjbb2lif2p u104eff53@4ax.c om...[color=blue]
> Steve Jorgensen <nospam@nospam. nospam> wrote:
>[color=green]
> >its programming model is hard to internalize,
> >so you'll generally get pretty poor Powerbuilder code from anyone who is[/color][/color]
not a[color=blue][color=green]
> >combat tested Powerbuilder expert.[/color]
>
> What does "hard to internalize" mean?[/color]

You have to wash it down with mass quantities of your
favorite adult beverage.

[Larry Linson]

Re: Front-end tools -- Which is the most productive?

"http://vmdd.tech.mylin uxisp.com/catalog/" <binhph@gmail.c om> wrote
[color=blue]
> After having seen my co-worker reinventing
> the wheel when he busily labored to build
> MS Access framework, I want to share
> my perspective.[/color]

That's interesting -- what's a "MS Access framework", and just what "wheel"
was your co-worker "reinventin g"? I only ask because I've been doing Access
since a month or so after it was released and never built a MS Access
"framework" . I've built a lot of database applications, and worked on a lot
more, and I never felt I was "reinventin g the wheel". So I'd be very
interested for you to clarify.
[color=blue]
> Having experienced with Access, Visual
> Basic, Visual C++, and PowerBuilder, I
> think Sybase's PowerBuilder is the most
> productive tool to build front-ends for any
> database or client/server applications.[/color]

As far as I know, PowerBuilder is just for database applications, but maybe
they have expanded its scope in recent times. I never used PowerBuilder but
some time ago worked on an Access project with a colleague who'd been
considered "expert" in PowerBuilder. To put it politely, he said he much
preferred Access for developing front-ends to server databases.

I've worked in Access and Visual Basic, and know enough about Visual C++ (or
C++ in general) to know that is the order in which I'd choose a tool to
create a database front end. VC++ is great for "getting close to the metal"
but it's a tough way to create modestly simple database applications. (I'd
would not be surprised to find PB less trying than C++ for DB front ends.)
[color=blue]
> PowerBuilder's datawindow
> is very powerful.[/color]

Access has a number of very powerful features, too. One of them is that it
includes a database engine, so you don't need a server database to create
applications. My understanding of PB is that it can front-end a server
database, but contains no database engine of its own. So, if I understand
correctly, PB can be compared to one of multiple features provided by
Access, that is, client-server.

[Steve Jorgensen]

Re: Front-end tools -- Which is the most productive?

On Thu, 23 Sep 2004 22:06:06 GMT, Tony Toews <ttoews@teluspl anet.net> wrote:
[color=blue]
>Steve Jorgensen <nospam@nospam. nospam> wrote:
>[color=green]
>>its programming model is hard to internalize,
>>so you'll generally get pretty poor Powerbuilder code from anyone who is not a
>>combat tested Powerbuilder expert.[/color]
>
>What does "hard to internalize" mean?[/color]

Hard to learn to understand how to use it in the most effective and reliable
way.

[Tony Toews]

Re: Front-end tools -- Which is the most productive?

Steve Jorgensen <nospam@nospam. nospam> wrote:
[color=blue][color=green][color=darkred]
>>>its programming model is hard to internalize,
>>>so you'll generally get pretty poor Powerbuilder code from anyone who is not a
>>>combat tested Powerbuilder expert.[/color]
>>
>>What does "hard to internalize" mean?[/color]
>
>Hard to learn to understand how to use it in the most effective and reliable
>way.[/color]

Ah, gotcha.

Thanks, Tony
--
Tony Toews, Microsoft Access MVP
Please respond only in the newsgroups so that others can
read the entire thread of messages.
Microsoft Access Links, Hints, Tips & Accounting Systems at

http://www.granite.ab.ca/accsmstr.htm

[Alan Webb]

Re: Front-end tools -- Which is the most productive?

Yah. Sounds like a commercial to me. There is also a fair amount of effort
to make Eclipse the IDE of choice for many. Last time I checked the site I
didn't see much that was specifically for database stuff, but the support
for Java was pretty good and you could use Java to manipulate data.
http://www.eclipse.org if you want to check out what they are doing.

"http://vmdd.tech.mylin uxisp.com/catalog/" <binhph@gmail.c om> wrote in
message news:bb3470aa.0 409222053.79396 f84@posting.goo gle.com...[color=blue]
> After having seen my co-worker reinventing the wheel
> when he busily labored to build MS Access framework, I want to share
> my perspective.
>
> Having experienced with Access, Visual Basic, Visual C++,
> and PowerBuilder, I think Sybase's PowerBuilder is the most
> productive tool to build front-ends for any database or
> client/server applications. PowerBuilder's datawindow
> is very powerful.
>
> Binh
> http://vmdd.tech.mylinuxisp.com/catalog/[/color]