Data Based Advisor articles from November 1991

Data Based Advisor archives from November 1991

Dataline.
November 1, 1991... BOULDER, CO -- Force, the dBASE compiler from Sophco, Inc., has changed ownership, reverting back to former company co-founder, Mike Ceranski. In the works: an upgrade a deal whereby Ceranski becomes president of Dvorak Software Development,...

Software Publishing Corp. (Superbase 4 1.3) (brief article) (Product Announcement)
November 1, 1991... Software Publishing Corp. has announced an upgrade to Superbase 4 1.3, their database manager for Windows. Some of the newer features include SQL Server support, and more image formats, display, and printing options. The company claims...

ButtonWare Inc. (PC-File 6.0) (brief article) (Product Announcement)
November 1, 1991... ButtonWare, Inc. released the newest version of their X-Base flat-file database, PC-File 6.0. The company claims version 6.0 is friendlier and more usable since it has a Windows-like interface with buttons, scroll bars, pull-down menus, and...

Black & White International, Inc. (Dr. Switch-ASE 2.0 program library) (brief article) (Product Announcement)
November 1, 1991... Black & White International, Inc., shipped Dr. Switch-ASE 2.0, a TSR library for Clipper and X-Base apps. Version 2.0 allows developers to create RAM-resident X-Base apps that the company claims require only 13K to 19K of conventional...

Borland International Inc. (Borland C++ & Application Frameworks) (brief article) (Product Announcement)
November 1, 1991... Borland International, Inc., has released Borland C++ & Application Frameworks, an object-oriented development language with application frameworks for speedier Microsoft Windows and DOS application development. This package includes tools...

Software update: Windows watch.
November 1, 1991... A lot of companies are releasing application development products for Microsoft Windows. So many, in fact, it's becoming difficult to keep track of them all. To help you choose the best tools for your Windows development projects, here's a...

FYI.
November 1, 1991... Second Quarter 1991 increase in sales of Windows apps in percent: 208.8 Decrease in sales of DOS applications: 2.1 At the Borland shareholder's meeting, Sept. 24, the number of votes in favor of increasing the number of shares of...

Questions, always questions. (Editor on the Go) (Editorial)
November 1, 1991... With so much happening around the world and in our industry, the only thing certain is that nothing is. Every day, more questions. When the Berlin Wall fell we said, "What's next?" The death of the U.S.S.R. and rebirth of Russia, as it...

dGE and Flipper add graphs to Clipper apps. (ProWorks' Flipper 5.0, Pinnacle Publishing Inc.'s dGE 4.1)(Clipper graphic libraries)(applications) (Software Review) (Evaluation)
November 1, 1991... Pinnacle Publishing, Inc. 28621 Pacific Highway South Federal Way, WA 98003-0099 (800) 231-1293, (206) 946-1491 ProWorks P.O. Box 1635 Hermiston, OR 97838 (503) 567-1459 A picture is worth a thousand words. In this case, to be more...

ALib gives Clipper Summer '87 5.01 flexibility. (Microdome Enterprises of NJ Inc.'s ALib+ 2.0) (Software Review) (Evaluation)
November 1, 1991... When I first looked at ALib+ from Microdome Enterprises, I instinctively thought, "Not another Clipper library." Having experienced Clipper 5.01's power and flexibility, many of the functions looked redundant. Then a though struck...

All that glitters isn't gold. (Buzzwords International Inc.'s dAnalyst Gold 5.0)(includes related article on another developer's perspective on the product) (Software Review) (Evaluation)
November 1, 1991... With dAnalyst Gold 5.0 Buzzwords International made a valian attempt to address one of the most obvious shortcomings of dAnalyst 4.2--having to pay for options. In 5.0. they've consolidated a number of options into one package. However, all...

Microsoft's Developers' Tools Forum. (Show News)
November 1, 1991... Seattle, WA--Over 1,400 developers weathered Seattle's August rains to attend the Microsoft Developers' Tools Forum. Developers were as varied as the sessions, which covered everything from writing macros in Excel and Word for Windows to...

Using code blocks, again. (Hardcore Clipper column) (Tutorial)
November 1, 1991... One of the most difficult concepts to grasp in Clipper 5.01 is the application of code blocks. In this article, using one of Nantucket's sample programs as the key example, I'll show you how you can use code blocks to reduce the size of...

Multi-table form tricks. (Paradox Programmer column) (Tutorial)
November 1, 1991... For some data-entry processes, you'll need a multi-table form to hold all the data for records. In Paradox, it's easy to develop forms that link records from multiple tables. To design a multi-table form, you design a form for each of the...

Picklists, scene 2. (Mac Rubel's Power Tools column)(includes a related article on using the Enter key in BROWSE) (Tutorial)
November 1, 1991... Last month, after spending what seemed like an incredible amount of time opening and closing the look-up table, you wedged in a single line of code that had to do with the actual lookup: "isfound = seek(var[underscore]val)". This month,...

Documentation for users. (The VAR Report) (Column)
November 1, 1991... Hardly anyone likes documentation--to write it, to pay for it, or to crack open the manual and read it. Yet even the simplest software generally needs some written instructions to make it complete. Good documentation gives your product a...

SQL-SELECT solutions. (FoxPro Developer)(structured query language)(includes related article on SQL order rules) (Tutorial)
November 1, 1991... As you may already know, SQL isn't an X-base language. SQL has its own vocabulary, syntax, and rules of order. As a result, it'll take some time and practice for X-Base programmers to master FoxPro's new SQL-SELECT statements. ...

Trailblazing the client/server jungle. (Client/Server Advisor)
November 1, 1991... Over the last few months, my team has successfully navigated the uncharted client/server jungles, suffering through thunderstorms of vendor hype, slogging through swamps of incompatible hardware, baking our brains under software glitches, and...

Understanding superservers. (Client/Server Advisor)
November 1, 1991... If your database has grown too large for a normal PC file server, you have to decide whether to move up to a mini or mainframe, spread your database over several PC file servers, or try one of the new superservers. "Superservers"--a...

How to analyze benchmarks. (Client-Server Advisor)
November 1, 1991... Benchmarks are specific programs written to calibrate the speed of computers or computer systems in a well-defined situation or type of computation. The sieve of Erastosthenes, for example, finds prime numbers. It's frequently used to...

Micro Data Base Systems Inc. (KnowledgeMan 3.0) (brief article) (Product Announcement)
November 1, 1991... Micro Data Base Systems, Inc., announced KnowledgeMan 3.0. New features include the ability to use object-based elements via KnowledgeMan's programming language (KGL), binary large objects (BLOBs), user-defined functions (IDFs), and a...

Computer Systems Advisers. (POSE 4.2 CASE toolkit)(computer-aided software engineering) (brief article) (Product Announcement)
November 1, 1991... Computer Systems Advisers announced a new version of their PC-based CASE toolkit, POSE 4.2. More enhancements include the addition of import and export features to the Data Model Diagrammer, export capabilities to the Data Flow Diagrammer...

Microsoft Corp. (Microsoft Seminar Series)(brief article)
November 1, 1991... Microsoft Corp. has announced the Microsoft Seminar Series, a series of ongoing seminars on the Microsoft Windows 3.0 environment, Windows applications, Microsoft networking products, and Microsoft applications for the Apple Macintosh. The...

GFA Software Technologies Inc. (GFA-BASIC for Windows and DOS) (brief article) (Product Announcement)
November 1, 1991... GFA Software Technologies, Inc. has announced GFA-BASIC for Windows and DOS, Windows development systems for creating Windows applications that can be converted to graphical DOS apps without rewriting the code. List price is $495. Contact...

Clipper and the other C - Borland C++. (Clipper Tip column) (Tutorial)
November 1, 1991... Clipper's Extend system allows programmers to write routines in C and call them from Clipper code. This not only provides the added flexibility of an alternate language but can give your programs a speed boost. The PF() function in this...

New tools for Visual Basic. (MicroHelp Inc.'s VBTools)(brief article) (Client/Server Advisor, Packets) (Product Announcement)
November 1, 1991... MicroHelp, Inc. released a new tools package, VBTools, for Visual Basic programmers. Features include mouse scrollbars, 3-D label controls, a color editor, file selection routines, assembly language routines to speed up your programs, and...

Microsoft gets COBOL into Windows. (Microsoft Corp.'s COBOL 4.5)(brief article) (Client/Server Advisor, Packets) (Product Announcement)
November 1, 1991... From Microsoft comes COBOL 4.5, a Windows development tool with a graphical user interface (GUI) for existing COBOL code. Included are several Windows-specific sample programs with documentation to help the transition. COBOL 4.5 uses a set...

GUI tool gives applications portability. (graphical user interface)(GUIdance Technologies Inc.'s Choreographer 2.0)(brief article) (Client/Server Advisor, Packets) (Product Announcement)
November 1, 1991... Choreographer 2.0, the GUI development tool from GUIdance Technologies, now supports Window 3.0 and OS/2. This new tool allows developers to move applications between Windows and OS/2 by simply recompiling the source code. Version 2.0 also...

R&R is at it again. (Concentric Data Systems Inc.'s R&R Report Writer 3.0) (brief article) (Client/Server Advisor, Packets) (Product Announcement)
November 1, 1991... The new SCO UNIX/XENIX Edition of R&R Report Writer for dBASE and compatibles is now available in Version 3. Users can report from databases created with dBASE IV and SCO FoxBASE+. Reports include columnar reports, forms, mail-merge...

DataFlex goes object-oriented. (Data Access Corp.'s DataFlex 3.0)(brief article) (Client/Server Advisor, Packets) (Product Announcement)
November 1, 1991... Possibly the most valuable new dimensions of DataFlex 3.0 are the object-oriented programming capabilities and pre-defined object classes and packages. According to Data Access Corp., all of the interface elements common to the SAA/CUA...

Act fast and save with Powersoft. (Powersoft Corp.'s PowerBuilder) (Client/Server Advisor, Packets) (Brief Article)
November 1, 1991... Powersoft is presently offering a 35 percent discount on their application development environment, PowerBuilder. Originally priced at $2,390, Powersoft has made PowerBuilder available for $1,495 through November 30, 1991. Better act fast....

PVCS breaks into SQL applications. (Intersolv Inc.'s PVCS 4.0)(brief article) (Client/Server Advisor, Packets) (Product Announcement)
November 1, 1991... Intersolv, Inc.'s newest PVCS configuration-management package (4.0) introduces the SQL export utility. The new release has a graphical user interface running under Windows and OS/2 that provides access to features via buttons, menus, and...

UniSQL forms Technology Partners Program. (Client/Server Advisor, Packets) (Brief Article)
November 1, 1991... UniSQL, developer of next-generation database management systems and application development tools for UNIX users, announced the formation of the UniSQL Technology Partners Program. Among the first to jump on the bandwagon are MIT's...

Database confidential. (Column)
November 1, 1991... Morale is low at financially-troubled Raima Corp. where a few dozen folks were dumped to avoid an even larger layoff. But Raima's still hanging on, planning to release Windows and Server products. Buzz hears the road is made rougher by the...

Great expectations. (Client/Server Advisor)(slow migration to client/server) (Memo to Management)
November 1, 1991... To find out why it still isn't quite "The Year of Client/Server," I informally surveyed selected developers, corporate network managers, server vendors, and my personal X-Base guru about what they expect from client/server databases. After...

User tools for SQL data access. (structured query language)(Gupta Technologies Inc.'s Quest, Channel Computing Inc.'s Forest & Trees)(Client/Server Advisor)(Windows Front Ends) (Software Review) (Evaluation)
November 1, 1991... FACTS Quest Gupta Technologies, Inc. 1040 Marsh Road Menlo Park, CA 94025. (800)876-3267 or (415)321-9500 The requirements: PC/AT or higher with 2M RAM, hard disk, EGA or better, running Microsoft Windows 3.x. The...

Distributing enterprise data. (Client/Server Advisor)
November 1, 1991... Many large corporations are discovering that sharing enterprise data with today's desktop graphical user interface (GUI) environments can be difficult and frustrating. The traditional way is simply to connect the workstation to the...

Handling SQL Server deadlocks. (structured query language)(Client/Server Advisor)(includes related article on lock jargon) (Tutorial)
November 1, 1991... One of the most aggravating SQL Server errors--one that's common in improperly-designed systems--is error #1205. This means your server command, or more accurately its process I.D., has been identified as being deadlocked with another...

Risks and opportunities. (developing applications for heterogeneous networks)(Client/Server Advisor)(Network Solutions)
November 1, 1991... If you can provide database services, and access to those services, on a wide variety of networks and computing platforms, you can add to existing systems, and make a nice living while you're at it. The challenge is to use multiple platforms...

Programming for client/server requires new ways of thinking. (Client/Server Advisor)(writing structured query language code with a database manager) (Tutorial)
November 1, 1991... Whether you use a database manager, a specialized query tool, or a third-generation programming language to develop client/server applications, one of the biggest problems you'll encounter is the reconciliation between the development...

Server scene. (Client/Server Advisor) (Illustration)
November 1, 1991... IBM 1133 Westchester White Plains, NY 10604 (800) 426-9292 (914) 934-4643 (international calls) The bad news is that OS/2.2.0's Data Base Manager (DBM) is a 16-bit implementation, not 32-bit. The good news? DBM is coming of age. The...

Managing very large databases. (Database Report)(includes related article on database management system capacity limits)
November 1, 1991... James A. Sheehy, V.P. of MIS for Superior National Insurance Co., and his staff of six manage a system that processes up to 25 million transactions a day. What's unusual is that they do it with an ordinary PC database manager, Microrim's...

12 developers and their hardware of choice.
November 1, 1991... Paul D. Colvin has been a programmer in dBASE dialects since 1981. He is President of p.c. Technologies, a systems consulting firm in the Chicago area, and is the author of "Asclepius," "Fax Support for TeleMagic," and the MSDS "HZMT" and...

A picturesque view. (using graphical notations to communicate details of complex software systems)
November 1, 1991... One of the biggest problems you probably face as a system developer is to communicate complex system details among members of your development team and between your team and users. Graphical notation can help. In this article, I'll show you...

Clipper class consciousness erupts! (Opinions) (public domain software Clip/++)
November 1, 1991... My editor thinks this column is about the false impression some people have that I've abandoned Clipper for FoxPro 2. Fooled him again! I've just seen an amazing piece of software, and I want to tell you about it. It's called Clip/++,...

Downsizing Expo urges attendees to try.
November 1, 1991... ANAHEIM, CA--The concept of moving strategic and mission-critical data from mainframes to PC-based LANs makes some MIS people very nervous--so nervous, in fact, that several of them declined to be interviewed for this article. Yet,...

Deja vu questions. (thread archives on DBADVISOR Forum)
November 1, 1991... Have you ever wished you didn't have to ask a question? You know, the type of question that's certain to have been asked before, one that gives you that "Haven't I been here before?" feeling. I've been on both sides of that coin and now...

Don't do client/server by this book. (W.H. Inmon's 'Developing Client Server Applications in an Architected Environment')
November 1, 1991... This is one book which, with any luck, you won't pick up. W. H. Inmon's Developing Client Server Applications in an Architected Environment (QED, 1991, $34.95) has one virtue: It's short. But its brevity is due to the author's lack of...

Variable life. (The Expert Series: Clipper column) (Tutorial)
November 1, 1991... One of the most significant, seemingly innocuous, changes to Clipper 5.01 is the extended life of a local varibale. Suppose that a local varibale is referred in to a codeblock for which a reference still exists, and the variable goes out of...

Windows and databases. (The Expert Series: Windows) (Column)
November 1, 1991... In 1992, several large software companies plan to release new database products for Windows. Some will be new developments, while others will be graphical versions of existing DOS databases. For example, Microsoft and Lotus plan to release...

More undocumented command line switches. (The Expert Series: Paradox column) (Tutorial)
November 1, 1991... Paradox command line switches are arguments that you add to the DOS command line when you start up Paradox. You place them between the word "paradox" and the name of the script that you want to start up. For example: paradox -mono -real...

Ten years after. (on-line storage)(Opinions)
November 1, 1991... I was idly turning pages, scanning reviews in one of the trade pubs when something said, "Turn back!" So I did. A little voice told me to look more closely at a review of network server disk boxes. The network server disk boxes were...

Designing for users. (Opinions)
November 1, 1991... "Historical accident has kept programmers in control of a field in which they have no aptitude... Learning to program has no more to do with designing interactive software than learning how to touch type has to do with writing poetry." --...

Using the screen builder. (The Expert Series: FoxPro column) (Tutorial)
November 1, 1991... FoxPro 2.0's screen builder requires developers to place all of their code in the design surface (an SCX file), and never modify the generated code (an SPR file). Once the generated code is modified, the screen builder can no longer be used...