Comments for First time ever: RAD Windows Database Development Survey

2002-02-21T02:03:25-08:00

2002-02-21T02:02:18-08:00

2002-02-21T02:01:36-08:00

First time ever: RAD Windows Database Development Survey

2002-02-19T13:24:32-08:00

The survey makes it quite clear that Borland wants to get rid of the BDE. This harkens back to the early days of delphi when they would give out surveys at the conference where you had to check off the size of your company. The choices were something like "Fortune 50", "Fortune 100", "Fortune 500" and one that basically meant "Go away, we don't care about you."At a later conference, David I. promised that Borland is not going to forget about small developers and leave us to rot by the side of the road. But I am doubting this more and more.As a small developer, developing small applications for small companies, the reality of my situation is that my clients do not want to spend the money on a client-server solution. They don't want to buy a server machine, they don't want to buy a client server database and they don't want to spend the extra money required for me to develop a client-server solution for them. Especially when client-server is overkill compared to their needs. (You don't use a 20 pound sledgehammer if you find an ant in your kitchen, do you?)I have found Paradox tables with the BDE to be an ideal solution for the small companies for whom I develop Delphi applications. If Borland gets rid of the BDE, my choices appear to be as follows:- Develop client server applications instead and lose all my current clients because they can't afford what it costs. Get a job in McDonald's sweeping the floor instead.- Develop applicaions using the MS Access file format. If I'm going to go partially with a MS solution, I might as well go all the way and switch to VB. If I'm using an inferior database format, I might as well use an inferior development tool as well.- Switch to Advantage, using the file server version of their product. This will work just fine, except for my biggest clients -- who are running legacy Paradox applications against the same data. I guess I could tell these clients to go away, then I can make up for all my missing income by sweeping the floor at McDonald's.- Keep using an old version of Delphi and get left in the dust.Of course, if my clients were all "Fortune 50" companies instead of "Go away, you're small potatos" I wouldn't have this problem. Borland would realize that for us "small potatoes" types, the BDE is important. Nearly everyone I've spoken to is in the same boat. Borland must not be listening to us, who supported it for all those years when the big boys were running on mainframes and using inferior tools to develop their pc-based solutions. If Borland was listening to us, that survey never would have been posted.Now that I'm done ranting and raving, I'm going to walk to the closest McDonald's and fill out an application.

re: First time ever: RAD Windows Database Development Survey

2002-02-16T07:07:28-08:00

As I mentioned in my first reply, why don't you just use a TSQLClientDataset (as opposed to a TSQLDataset and TClientDataset). It does pretty much the same as your typical TQuery/TTAble component.On another note, CDS have been around since D4 and the way it works has pretty much been the same all the way thru to D6. dbExpress came afterwards in D6, so it's not true to say that CDS's only purpose was for dbExpress - what do you think CDS's were doing before dbExpress came about? TSQLDataset were purposely designed to be read-only, forward-cursoring, etc, etc - they work well if you're designing multi-tiered in mind. I think Borland's move is smart because they too, realise that having a live open dataset as was provided by the TTable and TQuery components weren't scalable in the multi-user, multi-tiered world.If you still want the stand-alone DB application or your typical 2-tiered app then as I mentioned earlier you can still use the TSQLClientDataset.Cheer, Colin

A "state of the art" database application sample

2002-02-15T07:35:11-08:00

There were no comments box in the survey. So I'll add them here.I think that a complete real world N-tiers database application, written in the way you expect the users to use your data access components, would be a valuable addition to your RAD tools.Concerning Ib Express. Since it is free and open source software, I think it is not fair to announce it as a feature of your RAD packages.Moreover, IBX is great, but it really lacks the professionnal touch of competition (namely IBO). It's getting better everyday, but presented in the way it has been, it would have deserved a real documentation and finished components.

re: First time ever: RAD Windows Database Development Survey

2002-02-15T07:12:45-08:00

I'm converting my Paradox tables to Interbase/FireBird. I you use components like IB Objects that don't need the BDE, you come out with a small foot print, smaller than the BDE alone, I think. The drawback is that components like IBO are a lot harder to use than TTable and the DataPump is not very good. It's complex, but I'm converting from Paradox to Excel, Excel to .cvs and connecting to the TClientDataSet. From there I can go to Interbase or Oracle. The DataPump doesn't work well with Logical, Blobs or Dates. I have to use the Desktop to restructure the table before converting. If Borland wants to drop the Paradox Tables, they could do something to get the data into a different format.

First time ever: RAD Windows Database Development Survey

2002-02-15T06:59:55-08:00

That kinda dumb, after you hit the "Submit Form" button, it leaves you hanging there with "Thank you for participating in this survey". How about a button that takes you back to the Community??????

re: First time ever: RAD Windows Database Development Survey

2002-02-14T17:43:43-08:00

What's a KLUDGED component? If you need to do the interactive data access stuff you can always use the TSQLClientDataset component (well, not for Paradox!) in your single- or two-tiered apps. I find using the clientdatasets a lot more flexible than straight TTables/TQuery components. Cheers.