Re: 4GL vs. ESQL/C
From: "Carl Y. Wu" <carlywu2@yahoo.com> > >We are making a decision of whether to move our applications towards ESQL/C >(from 4GL) >My company is an ISP and our billing system is running on IDS 7.3. >The majarity of the billing system is written in 4GL, we use RDS version of >4GL in both development and production. >Two server programs which deal with customer signing up from the web use >TCP/IP sockets so they are written in C, and use the argument stack to call >4GL functions to do database access. >We are rewriting some components of the application system and some people >sugguest that we should move to ESQL/C and here are some of their >arguments: >1. ESQL/C is more portable, 4GL is not portable at all. Huh? In what way? >2. The sign up server programs should be rewrtten in ESQL/C rather than >half >in C and half in 4GL. because the push and pops on the argument stack are >"ugly". The effort to rewrite this now is, I'm sure, non-trivial. My first question is always: is it working? It is? Well, then, why **** with it? >3. C is a "more beautiful language" than 4GL. Gmpf. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, fer sure. That is, quite honestly, the stupidest thing I think I've ever heard. (Outside of New Labour, of course!) >To me it's certainly staying with 4GL. Move towards ESQL/C just for two >signup server programs' sake doesn't make sense to me. It *might* be worth rewriting those two programs, I'm not sure. But do be aware that the maintenance of ESQL/C is much more difficult, because that "beauty" comes at the price of comprehensibility. >Can you kindly give your opinions on which development tool you would >choose, or point to other information source of guidelines on choosing the >right tool for applications? ________________________________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free E-mail from MSN Hotmail at http://www.hotmail.com
In article <8kuitd$g1m$1@news.xmission.com>, "Obnoxio The Clown" <obnoxio@hotmail.com> wrote: > > From: "Carl Y. Wu" <carlywu2@yahoo.com> > > > >We are making a decision of whether to move our applications towards ESQL/C > >(from 4GL) > >My company is an ISP and our billing system is running on IDS 7.3. > >The majarity of the billing system is written in 4GL, we use RDS version of > >4GL in both development and production. > >Two server programs which deal with customer signing up from the web use > >TCP/IP sockets so they are written in C, and use the argument stack to call > >4GL functions to do database access. > >We are rewriting some components of the application system and some people > >sugguest that we should move to ESQL/C and here are some of their > >arguments: > >1. ESQL/C is more portable, 4GL is not portable at all. > > Huh? In what way? > > >2. The sign up server programs should be rewrtten in ESQL/C rather than > >half > >in C and half in 4GL. because the push and pops on the argument stack are > >"ugly". > > The effort to rewrite this now is, I'm sure, non-trivial. My first question > is always: is it working? It is? Well, then, why **** with it? > I think the point made was that they WERE going to rewrite it. The question was what should they rewrite it in? > >3. C is a "more beautiful language" than 4GL. > > Gmpf. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, fer sure. That is, quite > honestly, the stupidest thing I think I've ever heard. (Outside of New > Labour, of course!) > Funny. I thought Elle McPherson was beautiful... > >To me it's certainly staying with 4GL. Move towards ESQL/C just for two > >signup server programs' sake doesn't make sense to me. > > It *might* be worth rewriting those two programs, I'm not sure. But do be > aware that the maintenance of ESQL/C is much more difficult, because that > "beauty" comes at the price of comprehensibility. > This is the statement that provoked me to post a reply. <Ahem> Hey, that's not fair! I depends entirely on what the people who are doing the maintaining know. If ESQL/C is written correctly, it isn't difficult to maintain at all. > >Can you kindly give your opinions on which development tool you would > >choose, or point to other information source of guidelines on choosing the > >right tool for applications? > > ________________________________________________________________________ > Get Your Private, Free E-mail from MSN Hotmail at http://www.hotmail.com > > -- # unrm / ksh: unrm: not found # man cpio Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/ Before you buy.