Re: Which tools? Powerbuilder/Sybase or Oracle Dev2000

In article <19971020194500.PAA03594_at_ladder02.news.aol.com>, HughesMJ <hughesmj_at_aol.com> wrote:

Do we still have an FAQ out there for this stuff? I contributed to one about three or four years ago, and believe it or not, things haven't really changed all that much on this topic.

>I have been developing applications using Powerbuilder and Sybase for
>the last 3 years. My employer, a large blue-chip corporation, has just made
>the decision to drop Sybase/Powersoft completely and develop all new
>applications using the Oracle toolset. Can anyone offer me a reasoned
>argument why
>
>A. This is a good idea

I can't figure out whether you are using Oracle as your database now. There are certainly lots of reasons to prefer Oracle over Sybase as a database product, although price isn't one of them. If you are using and plan to be continuing to use Sybase, then it doesn't make any sense to switch to the Oracle toolset. If you are planning to move to any other major DB such as DB2, Informix or even MS SQL Server, you should also stick with PowerBuilder. But if you are already on Oracle, or are moving to Oracle, then Oracle's own tools provide lots of advantages over PowerBuilder.

>or
>B. This is a bad idea!!!
>
>Particularly, what are the differences between Powerbuilder and Oracle's
>equivelant - 'Developer 2000'? From a performance point of view but also
>from a developer's point of view.

They actually differ more from the developer's point of view than performance. You can get excellent performance out of both. You can develop much faster with Developer 2k once you make peace with its methodology. This can be quite difficult for a developer who is used to the traditional methods of application development. Developer 2k is very much a "RAD" tool. It has tremendous default capabilities and you can get a complete application up and running in remarkably little time. Many functions require much less coding than PowerBuilder.

However, it can be fairly onerous to do a good job of customizing the interface. In other words, if you like what you get by utilizing the defaults, you're in great shape. When you decide to make the Forms your own, prepare for a considerable amount of work.

Remember that Developer 2000 is actually a suite of programs. The Forms component is excellent. I haven't used Graphics much, so I can't really comment on that. The Report component is remarkably powerful, but difficult to learn and often frustrating--the new version in Developer 2000 v2 is reputed to be a major improvement (although only beta testers have it now as far as I know).

>From where I'm standing, this move would seem to waste the 3 good years
>experience I have and place me right back at the trainee level.

Not at all. Learning these kinds of programs is sort of like learning C once you have mastered Pascal. There are differences, sometimes big ones, but the similarities are more important. Most of the work in any application consists of defining the business rules and user interface, so it's really a matter of learning a new toolset. I'm not saying its a piece of cake, and I'm not saying you'll have an easy time of it--I'm not even saying you won't be constantly pining for PowerBuilder. But you'll realize soon enough how much those years of experience prepared you for dealing with the next product.

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Jack F. Love
Opinions expressed are mine alone, unless you happen to agree