Re: Visual Cafe nixes Jworks?

Cosmo Lee <cosmo@echonyc.com> wrote: :That's a very interesting press release. So what does this say about :the future of Jworks? If Informix is going to align w/ Symantec for :Visual Cafe, why would we need Jworks? Obviously we wouldn't and Jworks isn't ever going to be released as a separate product. At least I can't understand how they could do that as it would be a direct competitor. You generally do not release products that directly compete with the major product from someone you have a *strategic* cooperation with. From what I have seen of Symantecs Visual Cafe and what I know they are doing with the product Informix would also be *very* hard put to come up with something that could equal it. :This is all getting very confusing for prospective developers of client :apps and Informix customers. No, I think the air is (slowly) clearing up. : So how does one decide over New :Era/Jworks/Visual Cafe? You (probably) chose Visual Cafe. (The "probably" is there only because the announced product combination isn't released yet, but there is every reason to believe this will be top notch.) : With all of the Java announcements, the RIP :writing seems to be on the wall for New Era. RIP? I don't know what that means, but according to the news releases from Informix they will maintain and develop NewEra. They have to do that for their current customers. Also Java is at a very early stage yet, so if I had a project that was near the coding stage and had to be finished within a definite deadline, I would be somewhat carefull chosing Java right now. Java is still for those who can experiment and learn. If you have done that, and found it's usefull for your purposes, it's surely also possible to develop true applications right now. If you have not done that however, you know from the experience of others that NewEra (and other similar products like Delphi, Visual Basic, PowerBuilder and Forte) can be used right now for a certain set of applications. With those products you don't have to find out whether they can be used or not, only how to use them. In half a year there will probably be enough experience arround using Java for database type applications that we will have a similar knowledge about Java. At that time Java can be selected as an implementation tool more on such experience and less on your own trials. We are in such a trial and learning face with Java, but are currently waiting for the Java Development Kit ver. 1.1.1 to be available with Visual Cafe. :Does Visual Cafe do all that Jworks is supposed to do? If so, why :choose Jworks? I suppose the SuperTable editor would be one plus. I don't know JWorks, but am quite sure that Visual Cafe can do all that JWorks was supposed to and then some. I don't think the SuperTable's where ever a very good idea, at least not very well implemented. Symantec have their dbAnywhere solution, Informix is coming with their DataDirector solution. I don't know much about any of them yet. However the great new thing to do *seems* to be to implement "bussiness objects" where all the database access is located. This makes multi tier applications reasonably simple. In your GUI layout you then wouldn't refer to tables and columns at all, but to bussiness object data or methods that supplied and updated the data you present on the GUI. This is not currently directly supported even by the Visual Cafe GUI layout, but Symantec knows about this mode of working, and may do something to support it better. You can also do it in the current version, but it may require more of your own coding than one might wish. We are currently investigating the different options in this area. Daniel Schultz <schultd@sprintmail.com> wrote (in another post in this thread): :And what about the new, and unendorsed, contender, JBuilder from :Borland? Oracle have chosen to cooperate with Borland in a similar manner to Informix's cooperation with Symantec. For this reason, and the fact that Borland isn't exactly the best of names to assosiate with these days due to their financial and other troubles, I think Informix's choice of Symantec is a much better one. Oracle may have to buy Borland to pull it all off. Symantec is also to a much larger extent in the mainstream of Java development with their very near cooperation with Netscape and Javasoft (Sun). They have a similar strategic cooperation with Netscape to be their prefered development platform for the Netscape One initiative which includes their IFC (Internet Foundation Classes) library. As this is now going to be combined with the AWT from Javasoft into the JFC (Java Foundation Classes) and finally give us the much needed GUI design basis that is an absolute prerequisit for the success of Java, Symantec is the right choise. Borland has even been playing with Microsoft in Java development, and that is *not* the right place to go. If Microsoft should get as much as a toe inside the basic development of Java (as they might have gotten with the AFC library if it haddent been for JFC) Java would, with all probability, slowly but surely have been relegated to a pure MS Windows development tool. An interesting one, but not what Java can now become. : The confusion is gathering like summer thunderheads! Luckily there aren't many of those in Norway. Nils.Myklebust@idg.no NM Data AS, P.O.Box 9090 Gronland, N-0133 Oslo, Norway My opinions are those of my company The Informix FAQ is at http://www.iiug.org