itkin@mrspoc.Transact.COM (Steven M. List) (02/14/91)
I got to attend the announcement of Borland's newest product last night.
It's called ObjectVision. I assume some of you out there have already
seen it, since it's been in beta for months. But this was the official
public kickoff. It's COOL!
It's a graphical, visual, object oriented application development package.
And it's Windows-based! Borland is making a commitment to Windows, as
well as being REAL chummy with Novell, now.
ObjectVision let's you paint forms, creating fields using the mouse and
then setting the properties using pull-down menus and point-and-shoot stuff.
Real slick. Fields can be any of the typical data types (number, string,
date, time, boolean,...) as well as screen types (check box and such). You
can link fields to database fields, choosing from Paradox, dBase 3, delimited
ASCII, and... Can't remember, sorry. Anyway, if the database table doesn't
exist, OV will create it for you. If the database does exist, then it lets
you map between form fields and database fields. And determine whether the
link is for read or write or both. And one screen field can read from one
database field and write to another.
And then there's the Rules. The way you control processing is with the
Rules Trees. These let you specify what is basically flowchart logic,
including spreadsheet-like formulas and conditions and conclusions. The
system is smart enough that if you add a condition in the Tree that doesn't
exist on the form, it'll add it to the form (that is, optional selections)
for you!
I'm really not doing it justice. I'd compare it to Nexpert Object from
Neuron Data (an expert system shell and development environment), ToolBook
(but faster, requires no coding, and more flexible in some ways), and some
of the visual-type databases (like Superbase 4?). It's an outstanding
product, from what I saw, and the pricing is pretty slick, too...
List price is $495, but it's $99.95 for the first 121 days (starting the
19th when it officially ships). And the Runtime package is $495, but you
only have to buy it once and there're NO royalties!
I'd check it out. My copy arrives next week! YAY!
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: Steven List @ Transact Software, Inc. :^>~ :
: Chairman, Unify User Group of Northern California :
: {apple,coherent,limbo,mips,pyramid,ubvax}!itkin@guinan.Transact.COM :