Data Based Advisor articles from April 1991

Data Based Advisor archives from April 1991

Dataline.
April 1, 1991... DATALINE Apple Decision May Boost Ashton-Tate's Chances in Court SAN FRANCISCO -- The on-going courtroom saga regarding look-and-feel took a new twist recently in a copyright infringement suit brought by Apple Computer, Inc. against...

Rightsizing. (Microsoft Corp.'s approach to downsizing) (Editor on the Go) (editorial)
April 1, 1991... Rightsizing Is Microsoft transporting us to a brighter tomorrow...or taking us for a ride? For users of Microsoft operating systems, the route hasn't been all that straight. IBM, supposedly car-pooling with Microsoft, now seems to be on a...

Feedback. (letter to the editor)
April 1, 1991... FEEDBACK Letter from Ashton-Tate Copyright protection for intellectual property is important not only to Ashton-Tate, but also to other software developers. We've been one of several companies--including Lotus, Microsoft,...

Serving up graphics in Windows applications. (Pinnacle Publishing's Graphics Server SDK) (Software Review) (Fast Takes) (evaluation)
April 1, 1991... Serving Up Graphics in Windows Applications Learning to program in Windows can seem like an overwhelming task. Graphics programming is even more difficult. Windows add-on products shouldn't add to that burden. Pinnacle Publishing, which...

Microrim, Inc. (announces release of R:BASE 3.1 Runtime) (Fast Takes) (product announcement)
April 1, 1991... Microrim, Inc. announced the release of R:BASE 3.1 Runtime which allows developers to distribute applications royalty free. Runtime lets developers distribute executable applications without requiring users to have a copy of R:BASE. Runtime...

Sequiter Software; SBT Corp. (release of CodeBase++; enhancement of Accounting Library) (Fast Takes) (product announcement)
April 1, 1991... Sequiter Software announced the release of CodeBase++ version 1.0, their library of multi-user database management functions for C++. CodeBase++ functions work directly with dBASE IV data, index, and memo files. It's priced at $295. For...

Writing code, SBT-style. (Developers' Platform from SBT Corp.) (Fast Takes) (evaluation)
April 1, 1991... Writing Code, SBT-Style Developing systems from the ground up is perhaps the most satisfying programming I do, but the fact remains that many times this kind of development becomes a losing proposition. It takes an inordinate amount of time...

MapInfo Corp. (introduces MapInfo for Windows desktop mapping software) (Fast Takes) (product announcement)
April 1, 1991... Mapinto Corp. announced Mapinto for Windows, a Windows 3.0-compatible version of their desktop mapping program. Mapinto for Windows lets you visually manipulate and analyze your data. It supports DBF and Lotus 1-2-3 file formats. With...

Coding magic with Multi-Edit. (American Cybernetics, Inc.'s program editor) (Software Review) (Fast Takes) (evaluation)
April 1, 1991... Coding Magic with Multi-Edit If you try the new version (5.0) of American Cybernetics' program editor, Multi-Edit, be prepared to leave your old editor behind. This is one of the most flexible, functional, fun editors I've worked with. ...

FYI. (Fast Takes)
April 1, 1991... FYI Number of stationary bicycles in Natucket's corporate gym: 3 Percentage increase in software sales if piracy were eliminated in the U.S.: 15 Percentage increase in software sales if piracy were eliminated in Japan: 90 Rank...

Tools & Techniques. (announces Data Junction 4.0 data conversion utility) (Fast Takes) (product announcement)
April 1, 1991... Tools & Techniques announced version 4.0 of Data Junction, their data conversion utility. Version 4.0 features: Conversion Specs that let you automatically format data during a conversion; a maximum field size of 32K; a REPEAT command to...

COOLed off. (COOL 2.0, from Paul D. Sheriff and Associates) (Software Review) (Fast Takes) (evaluation)
April 1, 1991... COOLed Off COOl, from Paul D. Sheriff & Associates, is an acronym for Clipper Object Oriented Library." The disk label bills it as "A true, object-oriented/-multi-user Clipper library." It's a clever acronym and a great name for an...

Developing FoxPro Applications.
April 1, 1991... Mining for FoxPro Information Developing FoxPro Applications by Dr. Peter L. Olympia and Kathy Cea is a "must have" for all serious FoxPro developers. The authors have produced the first authoritative book on FoxPro program development. ...

Contributors. (Fast Takes)
April 1, 1991... Contributors Mark Aurit writes software and articles on software in Los Angeles, Calif. You can contact him on CompuServe at 71327,2534. John Bauman is a physician and Fox programmer in San Antonio, Texas. He can be reached on...

Set up your accounting records, part 2. (recording and classifying accounting information) (The VAR Report) (tutorial)
April 1, 1991... Set Up Your Accounting Records, Part 2 In Part 1 of this three-part article, I discussed the components that should make up any accounting system. I discussed the basic unit of an accounting system, the transaction, and showed how this...

Produce pop-up menus. (Mac Rubel's Power Tools)(technical column) (tutorial)
April 1, 1991... Produce Pop-Up Menus I could spend the next year discussing nothing but menus. For now, I'll try to keep it to this article. To do this, I won't engage in any lengthy discussions of the types of menus to use, menu colors, the order of the...

Controlling key violations. (includes a related article on Paradox's three editing modes) (Paradox Programmer)(technical column) (tutorial)
April 1, 1991... Controlling Key Violations Paradox strongly enforces a very important relational property: unique keys. When you create a table, you can specify that a field, or a combination of fields, be the key for the table. Keys must be unique, and...

List screens to printer. (Clarion Tip) (tutorial)
April 1, 1991... List Screens to Printer I use this procedure to print a FORM without having to write a REPORT. It passes the active screen as an external parameter, without using lots of code and memory. Using Clarion's internal functions ROW(), ROWS(),...

The secrets of array handling, part 2. (Hardcore Clipper)(technical column) (tutorial)
April 1, 1991... The Secrets of Array Handling, Part 2 Last month we looked at Clipper 5.0's array handling capabilities. 5.0 arrays are important in that they allow you to model any data structure. This month I show how Clipper objects are implemented as...

Painless screen reports. (using Paradox 3.5's README.COM program) (PAL Tip) (tutorial)
April 1, 1991... Painless Screen Reports With Paradox 3.5, you can send your reports to the screen, but the results are difficult to read and not very manageable. Paradox provides a program, called README.COM, to browse the README file. What the manual...

You too can succeed. (at downsizing) (Downsizing Solutions)
April 1, 1991... You Too Can Succeed To MIS people, developers, managers, and users involved in downsizing projects, keept at it. You can win and win big. The LAN environments you're implementing benefit from PC-based software and applications with friendly and...

Four rules for downsizing databases. (Downsizing Solutions)
April 1, 1991... Four Rules for Downsizing Databases It's easy to figure out why organizations are downsizing their database applications. After all, corporations can lower hardware and software costs, decrease development times, reduce maintenance costs, create...

The MARINER project. (Mobil Oil's satellite communications network; includes a related article on a new approach to systems development) (Downsizing Solutions)
April 1, 1991... The MARINER Project Mobil links its worldwide operations through an intricate transportation network that includes one of the world's largest marine fleets. The job of providing systems to support Mobil's marine operations belongs to the Marine...

Making the move to database servers. (includes glossary) (Downsizing Solutions) (tutorial)
April 1, 1991... Making the Move to Database Servers Pros and Cons of Database Servers IBM's IBM OS/2 Extended Edition Pros * Safe; almost guaranteed compatibility with DB2 * SAA-compliant language APIs *...

You take the high road and I'll.... (adding query optimization to a data base management system) (Database Developer)(technical column) (tutorial)
April 1, 1991... You Take the High Road and I'll... When you're trying to search or retrieve data from a database, the system can follow many different paths to a particular result. If the application interacts with the database via a high-level data access...

Laying the foundation. (using Clipper 5.0's arrays and code blocks) (Clipper Developer)(technical column) (tutorial)
April 1, 1991... Laying the Foundation In last month's article, I used Clipper concepts to describe some of the technical jargon surrounding object-oriented programming or OOP. This month I'll examine the new features of Clipper 5.0 that you'll use to...

Flex reports, part 2. (Hands-On FoxPro)(technical column) (tutorial)
April 1, 1991... Flex Reports, Part 2 Last time, we discussed varabile-width reports using the IIF() function and arrays to handle situations in which you don't know how many columns your report will contain. In your next Report Writer challenge, the FRX...

When a database manager hides behind Windows. (Superbase 4 Windows 1.2 from Precision Software Ltd.; includes related article on the inclusion of embedded Structured Query Language in Superbase 4 Windows 1.3) (Software Review) (evaluation)
April 1, 1991... When a Database Manager Hides Behind Windows Unless you've been in a cave for the last year, you've seen a lot in the press about Microsoft's latest release of Windows 3.0. There's also been a plethora of Windows-based applications...

Memory hog. (efficient memory use with FoxPro)(includes related article on specific set-up recommendations) (FoxPro Performance)(column) (tutorial)
April 1, 1991... Memory Hog Memory has one purpose -- to make your applications run faster. But if you have so much memory that programs and databases are accessed entirely from memory, you've wasted your money. You'll find that runtimes begin to level off...

Ten ways to survive the recession. (Opinions)
April 1, 1991... Ten Ways To Survive the Recession At first, no one wanted to say it. The government called it a "meaningful downturn," "negative growth," then "disappointing numbers." (Then again, this is the same government that refers to peace as "Permanent...

... Went to the well but the water was dry....(surveying the data base management system arena) (Opinions)
April 1, 1991... [underscore] Went to the Well but the Water was Dry [underscore] It's bleak. FoxPro 2 and Arago sound like they'll answer our prayers, but we've heard that before. If either is less than a year late it'll be prompt by DBMS standards--but you...

Software patents and Rushmore technology. (possible effects of patent protection) (Opinions)
April 1, 1991... Software Patents and Rushmore Technology A core component of the forthcoming FoxPro 2.0 is its new query technology, Rushmore. If benchmarks can be believed, Rushmore speeds up database queries a thousandfold and more. Even if the results...

Cursor placement. (R:BASE Tip) (tutorial)
April 1, 1991... Cursor Placement Experienced programmers know it doesn't take much to make their users panic, so they never let programs whir on for more than half a second without a message on the screen to tell users what's happening. One of the ways...

California dreamin'. (profile of Borland International Inc.; includes related articles on the Paradox data base management system, Borland's relationship with Novell, and the failed takeover of Ashton-Tate) (Special Report) (company profile)
April 1, 1991... California Dreamin' Scotts Valley is one of those places you admire quickly. It's too tiny to pay much attention to as you zip by on California Highway 17. From the Silicon Valley, the twists and turns of the road demand two-fisted driving...

Borland's new vision: ObjectVision. (Borland International Inc.) (Special Report)
April 1, 1991... Borland's New Vision Borland International recently unveiled Object Vision, its first Windows-based software. Borland is promoting this new release as "an application development environment for Windows." Many people are having trouble...

Make your code database-independent. (Hands-On Clipper)(technical column) (tutorial)
April 1, 1991... Make Your Code Database-Independent In my February article we explored the basic principles of how Clipper 5.0's Replaceable Database Drivers (RDDs) are implemented. I also touched on some methods to get your applications ready for the...

Client communication. (using the telephone for greater productivity) (Consulting Tip)
April 1, 1991... Client Communication No matter how busy I am, I return calls within 24 hours, even if it's just to say, "I'm really busy right now--can I call you back next week?" If there's no answer and no phone answering machine, I send a fax. The...

Build strong relationships. (Clipper Developer) (technical column) (tutorial)
April 1, 1991... Build Strong Relationships Let's return to the basics of the language and the theory of application development to show how to solve database management issues with Clipper. The advantage of a relational database is the ability to relate...

Use your time wisely. (TAPCIS moves thought time off-line)(includes information on obtaining TAPCIS) (DB Connections)(column) (tutorial)
April 1, 1991... Use Your Time Wisely The dollars add up when you spend time on Data Based Advisor's CompuServe Forum browsing messages, responding to them, or looking for files to download from the Library. Some users abandon CompuServe as being "too...

Database confidential. (humor, rumors and gossip)
April 1, 1991... Database Confidential Computers can be hazardous to your health. They say heavy PC usage can lead to carpal-tunnel syndrome, VDT emission exposure, backache, eyestrain and a dull personal life. (That's why Buzz-about-town only writes these...