dan@blender.UUCP (Dan Keizer) (11/19/89)
After learning Speedware 4GL I'm starting to get involved with bbj's
Today 4GL language. As far as I can see, it has a rather slow process
for creating programs. All are screen-entered. I have heard "rumours"
that the new/newer version will have the possibility of a full-screen
editor. Wow, eh? This is one of those languages that provides you with
a complete programming environment ... to the point where it even provides
you with menus to program with! ick. But, is anyone else using or has used
this language, and how did they like it. Speedware seems to have more
flexibility ... I may have to choose which one I want to use ... any
other comments/questions/horror stories would be helpful.
Thanks.
Dan.
--
Dan Keizer
UUCP: ...!uunet!{ubc-cs|watmath}!calgary!xenlink!blender!dandjw@hpldsla.HP.COM (11/29/89)
> After learning Speedware 4GL I'm starting to get involved with bbj's > Today 4GL language. As far as I can see, it has a rather slow process > for creating programs. All are screen-entered. I have heard "rumours" > that the new/newer version will have the possibility of a full-screen > editor. Wow, eh? If you have used BBJ/Today and you are on HP equipment, you might try looking at "HP ALLBASE/4GL". I worked fairly closely with both BBJ/Today and ALLBASE/4GL for a while, and thought '4GL was pretty good. ALLBASE/4GL has a lot in common with BBJ/Today (ALLBASE/4GL was once called HPtoday!), it provides essentially all of Today's good features, and may address the concerns that you have mentioned - and it's from HP! :-) > This is one of those languages that provides you with > a complete programming environment ... to the point where it even provides > you with menus to program with! ick. '4GL also provides the complete programming environment, although I found '4GL's user interface to be far superior to Today's. '4GL has these awesome screen and report painters! It also makes really good use of terminfo stuff, and has great support for terminals with function keys, color, etc.. In addition to the 'packaged' programming environment, you can dump anything from the system into an ascii file. Then you can edit it, and load it back in. So you don't have to deal with the 'environment' if you don't want to. In general I found the ALLBASE environment pretty easy to use, but sometimes I just wanted an ascii file so that I could grep on the source (or whatever). That's when I used the dump feature. As an aside, I used this dump/load thing to automatically generate application definitions from my database SQL schema (using a big shell/awk script). It saved a lot of mindless typing! On this line, ALLBASE/4GL has an automatic code generater. You punch in your data dictionary stuff for a file (like in Today), then fill in the module builder form, push the 'go' button and it creates an application module: screen(s), logic code and messages. It's really quick for getting modules up an running quickly. The module builder works from 'module templates' to generate the code. The ones that are supplied are pretty bad, so the code (the logic code) that is generated is pretty bad. The good thing is you can redefine the templates to suit your own needs. Once you do this, the module builder is great. > But, is anyone else using or has used this language, and how did > they like it. Like I say, I used Today, but I liked ALLBASE/4GL more. I also looked at Speedware, but I couldn't provide any strong comparison either way. Hope the information helps some. David Williams _______________________________________________ Hewlett-Packard Scientific Instruments Division Palo Alto, CA, USA. HP-UX Mail: djw@hpldsla.hp.com