Re: Is Anyone Using Passport?

Scott Holmes wrote: } } I have recently been rewriting one of our 4gl programs with a product } called Passport. I'm using an NT for development of a graphical } interface and will soon start experimenting with their character base } interface on an SCO. I've yet to make contact (outside of the Passport } Company, itself) with anyone using this product and am curious if any } readers of this list have tried it. I had previously re-written our } entire suite of programs in New Era but we decided not to market it. I } believe the reasons for this were almost entirely because of the pricing } structure. } } I cannot comment on the usability of what I've done, so far, as I'm the } only one who's seen it. But, it is comparable to anything I was able to } provide with New Era in terms of features. I've noted in the manuals } some variation in procedural calls between the character based and the } graphical systems but I've yet to evaluate the impact of maintaining } both versions. Passport also provides what they've called a "Passport } Java Presentation Applet" which reportedly allows access to } applications through the Internet or intranets. Apparently one need } only re-link an application to take advantage of this capability. I've } yet to try this. } } So, if there is anyone out there that has used or is currently using } this product, I'd appreciate hearing from you. } } Thanks, Scott We started using Passport to port our entire WDLink enterprise product from a character world to the graphical world. The primary incentive for us to make such a time and financial investment, was their claim that the same "source" would run under X-windows, Windows and character. We sent two of our developers back to NJ for training, and had nothing but problems getting it to work from the start. They told me that they would not support Solaris X86, and that we should use SCO. We made a major OS change over in our office to SCO. We could not get Windows and X-Term programs to work similarly. We even had one of their engineers on-site for 3 days, and still no luck. In the end, they refunded our cost for the language (exclusive of the other major expenditures on OS change overs, hardware, training and time), saying that we had our servers configured incorrectly. By that time enough was enough. The language itself is very powerful, and very data centric, meaning they have an excellent interface to the database. This is much better than being screen centric, like MS Access or PowerBuilder. If I were planning on supporting only a windows/NT environment, or only a MOTIF/character environment, then I MIGHT give Passport another chance, but not in a mixed environment. Jim Zapapas OpenLink Systems, Inc. http://www.olink.com