O4W Examples Application Online.

Following my recent posting about the OpenInsight 9.2 Evaluation Edition being available, several of you have asked for the O4W Quick Start Guide application to be hosted on the web. This has now been done and you can get to the O4W examples application at http://tinyurl.com/37wvmsv.

The current version includes an example of a Customer Entry Form, an Order Report and a Sales Dashboard. This provides you with the opportunity to view the application before downloading the OpenInsight 9.2 evaluation edition (or upgrade if you are a WORKS subscriber) and running through the O4W Quick Start guide yourself.

Sprezz release updated RevertLHFiles utility.

The guys at Sprezzatura have recently upgraded their RevertLHFiles utility and the new version is now available. Please checkout their blog for more details.

3 reasons to take a look at OI 9.2.

As if you needed them, here are just three of the countless reasons why you, as a MultiValue developer, should be looking at OpenInsight 9.2. Using one fully integrated toolset, OpenInsight 9.2 now enables you to:

1. Very quickly and easily extend the life of your leading MultiValue applications for LAN, WAN and the Web deployments. Creating a web interface for your application can be done in just a few minutes using OpenInsight 9.2’s O4W.
   
   
2. Interact with the entire Windows world in the easiest ways possible. This includes consuming .NET controls, ActiveX controls, Widgets, API’s, Windows hardware, third party applications and more.
   
   
3. Seamlessly support multiple databases from within your application using OpenInsight 9.2’s data connectors. Currently supported databases include OpenInsight’s linear Hash, Rocket Software’s Universe and Unidata (U2), TigerLogic’s D3 and numerous flavours of SQL (including mySQL, MS SQL Server, Oracle, etc.). Support for Univision will follow in a few weeks time.
   
   This can enable you to enhance your users experience and workflow by aggregating disparate data sources into one interface, whilst continuing to maintain those separate islands of data. This ensures data integrity is retained, whilst enabling your application’s users to read, write and maintain those islands of data AND it enables the users of those islands of data to continue to work with them outside of your application, as they do now.

OK, so there is a fourth reason. Revelation Software has just recently released a free to use OpenInsight 9.2 evaluation version of the toolset – including the data connectors and O4W.

Mention this code (MDP92100810) and you’ll receive an installation key for a full 60 day period, rather than the usual 30 days.

OI 9.2 Evaluation now available.

Following the OpenInsight 9.2 commercial release, the 9.2 evaluation is now available for download via the RevUK web site.

If you have been waiting to try the new features in 9.2, then now is the time to grab the evaluation.

Back to rumors of a SCM tool in 9.2x

Well I’m now back from basking in the sun (mid 40’s Centigrade) and snorkeling over the Red Sea reefs in warm to hot water – fun. For those of you that are divers, Sharm El Sheik has some wonderful diving spots and those a little less adventurous; snorkeling with hundreds of fish over the inner reef is just amazing.

Anyway, annual vacation over and it’s back to work and back to some more OpenInsight development rumors. The first of which is very exciting as OpenInsight Source Code Management (SCM) tools were requested at the recent EMEA RUG in London and I hear that the guys at Revelation have been working on that request over the last couple of weeks.

My spies tell me that the SCM is invoked by simply setting an environment setting. The editor apparently saves a version of the code every time a program is saved or compiled, but only saved if it is different than the prior version. The versions of the source code are stored in a new table, with an associated ‘control’ table. Groups of code can be associated with version numbers, and an entire version can be rolled out for deployment, or rolled back and made the live version of the software. There’s also seems to be a comparison tool that lets a developer examine differences between different versions of code.

This new OpenInsight feature continues in development, but it is looking very exciting and I hope that many of you will find it hugely useful. It is certainly something that I have constantly been asked for over the last few years and it is great to, yet again, see that Revelation are listening to their developer community and delivering tools that are beneficial, rather than just fun to create.

Watch out for more on the SCM and more rumors about the next OpenInsight release as and when I learn about them.