Slide 1

Perspectives On Application Development Using Sybase Tools

Donald D. Clayton
President, Intertech Consulting, Inc.
[email protected] (713) 586-6481
April 27, 2004


Slide 2

Objectives




Review some decision frameworks regarding the use of
Sybase tools
Understand the Sybase tools strategy for application
development
PowerBuilder





PowerBuilder in a .Net World
Next Generation Web DataWindow

PowerDesigner


PowerDesigner For PowerBuilder Developers and PowerDesigner Futures


Slide 3

Audience Review





Which version of PowerBuilder are you on?
How many applications are you supporting?
How many of those are PFC?
What do your enhancement requests look like?






Bug fixes only
New functionality
Need to move functionality to Web

What are your company’s current development standards?


Slide 4

Decision Framework #1






Maintenance vs. New Requirements
Web vs. Non Web
Looking for a Silver Bullet?
It is important to have an effective baseline and know where
you want to go
Step 1: Know your PowerBuilder Code


Slide 5

Maintenance Mode Only




If it isn’t broken, don’t try to fix it.
There is lots of maintenance mode PB out there, mostly PB
6.5.1, with post Y2K fixes, etc.
But what if there are new requirements?



Stick with PB 6.5, which seems to work… Or
…move to newer version of PowerBuilder


Slide 6

Deployment Concerns



A major reason for moving to web-based computing is the
elimination of deployment concerns
How many of you would like to eliminate the tedious
installation of new and upgraded software onto the many PCs
in your far-flung company?
 Many companies use CITRIX or Terminal Services
 There are other options available
Softricity's SoftGrid
Exent Technologies
Stream Theory
Appstream
Egenera


Slide 7

Do You Need to Get To The Web?


There are numerous ways to get to the web with Sybase
products





PowerBuilder/EAServer Combo
HTML DataWindow
Web Services Tools in EAServer
3rd Party Code Generators or Migrators
Appeon
Metex


Slide 8

Decision Framework #2




What development tools do your strategic and tactical
application development platforms call for?
Sybase sees the App Dev World splitting into two large
camps with several smaller camps around them
Large Camps





Microsoft Visual Studio and .Net
Java

Small Camps





Borland Delphi
PowerBuilder
Centura
Oracle Forms


Slide 9

The .NET World of Microsoft
.The Future According to Microsoft


Microsoft’s vision of Windows application development is an
all encompassing environment with many benefits





Common runtime system
Type safe programming
Easy communication between different languages
Massive class library, from soup to nuts.


Slide 10

Microsoft’s App Dev Roadmap


Slide 11

The .Net Cool-aid





Microsoft intends to do all their applications development
and more under .NET.
C# will be the language of choice for everything that is not of
the kernel, which will remain in C/C++.
The scope of the runtime system and the class libraries is
almost breath taking.
Microsoft believes in this architecture strongly enough to
have upset their very large base of Visual Basic developers
with a radically (for them) new version Visual Basic.


Slide 12

Powerbuilder’s Place in .NET




Powerbuilder offers alternatives to Microsoft’s vision.
Sybase announced and has committed to a 4 phased .Net
strategy
Release 9.0




Release 10.0





Supports Web Services and XML
More support for Web Services
DataWindow .NET

Release 11.0




PB 11.0 will introduce compiler support for .NET, compiling Powerscript
directly to MSIL
Powerbuilder access to .NET class libraries
Allow .NET applications to access Powerbuilder objects.


Slide 13

Powerbuilder’s Place in .NET
Coming in the next release


The DataWindow .NET






For the Visual Basic programmer





Will be a citizen of the .NET world
The DataWindow technology will be extended to all languages supported in
the Common Language Runtime
Visual Basic.NET, C#, C++
A worthy competitor to the DataGrid control
The DataWindow offers features that will be enticing to VB programmers

For the Powerbuilder programmer



Where development in .NET is mandated, the investment in DataWindows is
protected.
The DataWindow will be familiar


Slide 14

The DataWindow .NET initiative
What is the DataWindow.NET?


A .NET data aware control





The .NET data aware object






Drop it on a Window Form
It supports the familiar set of DataWindow properties, events and methods
Instantiated using “new”.
Like the DataWindowControl, it will expose DataStore methods events and
properties.

The Powerbuilder database drivers
The DataWindow Builder


For DataWindow creation without Powerbuilder


Slide 15

The DataWindow .NET Initiative
Implementation


The DataWindowControl







Is a custom authored Windows Form.
Can be dropped on a Windows Form
Backed up by a C# class library that maps DataWindow functionality to
applications running within the Common Language Runtime
This class library includes the DataStore.

The DataWindow engine (server)






Powerbuilder DataWindow engine
Loads DataWindow definitions from pbls and pbrs
Communicates with the database drivers
Processes UI events in the screen real estate of the DataWindowControl
Does the screen painting.


Slide 16

The DataWindow .NET Implementation
How do you use it


From the Visual Studio .NET toolbox





.

Select and drop the DataWindowControl onto a Windows Form.
Two important properties are exposed:
Enter the name of the DataWindow Object to use in the DataWindowControl
Enter a library name from where to load the DataWindow Object


Slide 17

DataWindow .NET Implementation
How do you use it?


DataWindow Events..


The DataWindowControl will support the same set of events as the
DataWindow


Slide 18

Powerbuilder’s place in .NET
Powerbuilder futures


A future release of Powerbuilder will:





Allow Powerscript access to .NET class libraries




Compile Powerscript code to MSIL
Allow Powerscript to run under the Common Language Runtime
Allow Powerscript to consume both Microsoft and other .NET objects

Allow .NET objects to access Powerbuilder objects


NVO etc.


Slide 19

PowerScript.NET
How to create a PB target for .NET?


Create a .NET target




When creating a PB target, you will be able to create a .NET target. In this
target you can import and extend .NET classes written in other languages.

Create a normal target and compile it into MSIL


When creating a PB target, if you choose to create a normal target, you can
create a project to compile the target into a .NET application. However, in this
target, you cannot import or extend.NET classes written in other languages.


Slide 20

PowerScript.NET
What can you do with it?




Compile a PowerBuilder target into a .NET application.
Import and use .NET classes written in other languages.
Extend .NET classes written in other languages.


Slide 21

PowerBuilder 10: The “XML Web DataWindow”
Solution
Utilize latest web technologies:
 XHTML
 Client-side XML
 Client-side XSLT
 Standalone CSS stylesheet (with cascaded absolute positioning)


Slide 22

XML Web DataWindow
Browsers targeted:
B ro w s e r

X M L p a rs e r
X S L T p ro c e s s o r

X S L T v e rs io n

In te rn e t E xp lo re r 5 , 5 .5

M S X M L 2 .0

X S L -W D

In te rn e t E xp lo re r 6 .0

M S X M L 3 .0

X S L T 1 .0

N e tsca p e 6 +

T ra n sfo rM iiX

X S L T 1 .0

M o zilla 1 .0

T ra n sfo rM iiX

X S L T 1 .0


Slide 23

Why Use XHTML?
Benefits:
 Separation of presentation markup from content




Use of XML-specific technologies in architecture




Most fundamental principle in web development
DOM-based generation and parsing

Use of XML-specific tools for customizing


TreeView-based editing


Slide 24

Separating Presentation from Content
Within DataWindow:
 Content = data values of column, compute, and text controls
 Presentation = visual and functional properties of DW controls
Benefits of Separating:
 Accessibility
 Targeted presentation using stylesheets
 Improved processing by browser


Slide 25

XHTML Benefits
Accessibility








XHTML’s separation of visual elements from actual content make
page much more accessible to people with disabilities
XHTML more easily understood by people with visual impairments
using screen readers and voice browsers
Presentation can now be stored in separate stylesheet documents
(CSS and XSL) for XHTML page
Different stylesheets more easily generated for different browsers
United States, Section 508 of the Usability Act


Slide 26

Client-Side XML

XML Content

XSLT

Determines structural
layout

XHTML

Determines style of
elements as displayed
in browser

CSS


Slide 27

XSLT
Extensible Stylesheet Language Transformations
 Provides a way of transforming XML documents into other
document formats
 For XHTML (which is fundamentally XML), XSLT can be used to
transform an XML document into a styled XHTML web page for
display in a browser
 XSLT goes beyond CSS by allowing rules that change or infuse
the content with layout and structure


Slide 28

Why Use Client-Side XSLT?
Benefits:
 Saves bandwidth
 Clients only need to download and cache XSLT code once for
DataWindow session
 Server processing is reduced with more work being done on client


Slide 29

XML Web DataWindow Design

Server-Side

Client-Side
XML

DataStore

User request page
XSLT XHTML

XML Web DW
component

Step 2
DataWindow generated
in separate XML, XSLT
CSS, JS, with transform
script sent to client

CSS
Client-side
JavaScript

JS control

JS rows
JSP Page

Step 1
HTTP get

XHTML Page
Client-Side
Step 4
Client-side JavaScript
uses XSLT to transform
XML into XHTML and
displays this in the