Re: Oracle Web Application Server, PL/SQL, and HTML

Hi Danny,

> Has anybody written any critical or major web applications using PL/SQL with
> HTML and OWAS? We have written a few small applications so far and think
> it's just great!. We would like to move more legacy applications to web
> using pl/sql but are concerned that we might not be seeing the whole picture
> and would love to hear any comments from others using OWAS. This product
> just seems to good to be true after all the other crap we've run across.
>
> We are able to train new programmers in about a day how to write a pl/sql
> routine with html that we can deploy immediately to all our users internal
> and external. Security is built in. The really cool thing is that all our
> source code is stored in the Oracle Database Server which means alot easier
> management of our code, plus the server executes the PL/SQL not the client.

Really ? How do you do ? Do you have a version managment tool for packages on the server.If so please let me know.

> We have started using some javascript for form validation. We can even be
> at a users desk (thousands of miles away), pull up a browser and immediately
> see the code for the application. We also use a free tool called TOADSOFT
> (www.toadsoft.com) which makes working in oracle childs play! About the
> only real problem is that OWAS v3 is not very stable and is keeping us from
> delivering any critical applications. :( Uses get the 'internal error'
> every 20 hits or so. They just have to push the refresh button but it's
> very annoying. We are hoping OWAS or now OAS v4 will be much more robust.
>
> Is Developer 2000 easier or Java?

We are doing the same thing ( using SQL Navigator instead of toadi).At current we are building a completely web based application for campus administration.

Out of my expirience and according to want we did and discussed I can say :

DEV 2000 is a very elaborated tool. It provides you with the capability to rapidly evolv "simple" forms.
But it needs experience to know how to solve a given problem with DEV 2000 if your application is not so "simple".
Because it has default functionallity and if you don't know this from pieces you will quickly end up in trying to do
the right thing in the wrong place or viceversa. But if you know than DEV 2000 is absolutely great. If gives you clear and consistent transaction processing.
Furthermore you can deploy a Form to the web. This means you don't have to install runform and sqlnet on clients.
It runs as a java application, where the java application communicates with the server where runform actually runs.

But we are not using forms on the web at the moment because we tested it and found some problems in display on the web compared to display on windows platforms were we use it now. And on the other hand you depend with java on the browsers which supports the correct version of java. So we decided simply to wait till thing are stable and most of our clients are up to 4.xx Versions of current browsers.

But nevertheless we use and develop forms with DEV 2000 for small but highly sophisticated applications or for applications which belong to a small amount of people and where we have Oracle infrastructur already installed. For instance : managing lookup tables.

Out of my experience you are about 3 times faster developing a form with DEV2000 compared to OWAS and PL/SQL because you have to code each and everything with HTML Forms yourself and you don't have a session and have to take care about security.
If real transaction processing comes into play I would increase it to 5 times. The above is only true if programmer has enough experience.

OWAS and PL/SQL + Javascript enhancement is perfect when data should be accessible from everywhere and your application is either only presenting data or can be solved with simple forms. One of the features I'm really happy about is the great flexibilty of webforms, because the can be different for each call depending on any condition you can code. And one main reason why we rely very strongly on HTML + Javascript with OWAS and PL/SQL is that it is fast and flexibel compared to JAVA. But dealing with transactions is IMHO not really solved. But maybe thing are much better with OWAS 4.

JAVA : We did also a pure Java application because we had to deal with graphics. ( mouse drag and drop on maps )
The handicap we found out was that loading an application can take quit a long time compared to a generated HTML page.

Finally :
 HTML + Javascript is IMHO fast, flexibel and at the moment the broadest supported way for web applications
 In the main time we train and keep an eye on other possible ways.

Because you do things the same way we are doing it, please let me ask you some questions about everyday problems :

a.) How do you deal with back - button when user can navigate back to form where she or he is doing triggers insert or update when pressing SUBMIT.

      or asked the other way : How to prevent updates or inserts to happen when user does a reload or repost of a previous form.

b.) How do you do transaction processing.

Hope I didn't bore you. Would like to get mail from you again. Shed problems are half problems.

Regards
 Robo.

Received on Sun Jun 28 1998 - 10:25:54 CDT