Re: Anybody successful with Designer?

From: Sybrand Bakker <postbus_at_sybrandb.demon.nl>
Date: Sat, 24 Feb 2001 18:07:24 +0100
Message-ID: <3vpf9t0kjou1di3nurb5m26hbiaqfn0quh_at_4ax.com>


On Sat, 24 Feb 2001 16:52:02 GMT, "Mike Moore" <hicamel_at_mail.home.com> wrote:

>I would like to hear any success or disaster stories using Designer
>especially 6i.
>
>Our shop is about to embark on the design phase of our project, and the
>current plan is to use Designer 6i. Everybody in the shop is a beginner when
>it comes to Designer. We have all take the class from Oracle.
>
>I would just like to hear even one success story ( other that Oracle saying
>"we use it") before we jump in.
>Also, if you tried it but then had to jump ship, I would be most grateful to
>hear your thoughts as to what went wrong.
>
>TIA
>Mike
>
>
First of all a comment: Designer has been around now for more than 5 years. I would think Oracle would have withdrawn it (as they did with several other products) when Designer would have been unsuccesful. I already used the Designer predecessor, Oracle Case, back in 1993. The main thing to know is: you *can* generate your application 100 percent. If you really invest in using all options, which have improved over the years, you will be capable of generating 100 percent of your app. I have actually developers seen doing this. However, your development processes is going to be in several stages: - you design the entities first, in conjunction with modelling your business functions
- in a second stage you are going to create tables and forms and reports.
If you now decide to change your forms etc. *manually* you do actually what I always call 'cut the rope'. If you need to revise one of your entities, you can't generate the application again without redoing your manual changes.
In my company, a Dutch consulting firm, Designer is the standard development tool for new projects.
I have always loved Designer, though I am aware many people seem to hate it, and probably because of it's steep learning curve. I have the feeling Designer has a bigger installed base in Europe as opposed to the US, but I can't proof that.
At one stage I had the opportunity to compare Powerbuilder and Designer. My judgment of Powerbuilder was that it was awkward and cumbersome, and not especially geared at working with Oracle databases.

Just my 2 cents

Regards,

Sybrand Bakker, Oracle DBA Received on Sat Feb 24 2001 - 18:07:24 CET

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