Today's wide acceptance of distributed development and Web enabling applications have led many a developer to believe that J2EE represents the only 'real' solution for Web-enabling applications.

I recently received a copy of PowerJ 4 for evaluation. As a PowerBuilder developer turned Java developer, I was particularly interested in the Java DataWindow. I had developed JDBC software using a Java control known as the JTable, but I felt I was wasting time compared to what it took me to use the DataWindow painter, create a SQL-based DataWindow object, and use the DataWindow control to display it.

The mission of Sybase's PowerJ development team, based in Waterloo, Canada, was to produce the best Java development IDE for Sybase customers and the best integrated IDE for EAServer.. PowerJ 4.0 (Vancouver) will soon be generally available and it could be said that PowerJ has finally come of age in this excellent release, which is full of new features.

In this three-part series, you will learn a process for developing EAServer components. This series focuses on PowerBuilder component development, but the practices discussed can easily be applied to any language.

'Web services are a new breed of Web application. They're self-contained, self-describing, modular applications that can be published, located, and invoked across the Web. Web services perform functions, which can be anything from simple requests to complicated business processes.

PowerJ, Sybase's Java/J2EE development tool, is reaching a new phase in its evolution. With the soon-to-be-released PowerJ 4.0, the product has been given both an external and internal overhaul, and is a much more usable tool as a result. PowerBuilder developers will find the UI a lot more familiar than earlier versions of PowerJ, and J2EE component developers will find many new compelling features that will enhance their productivity.

My company, Internal Systems, sells a commercial application built using PowerBuilder. Our application is used by companies of varying types, and we found it necessary to support multiple back-end databases to accommodate the needs of our customers.

Every development shop that is currently managing its PowerBuilder source code with a third-party SCC tool and has not yet migrated to PB8 will need to understand the upcoming changes in methodology before attempting a migration. Even PBNative users will be affected, as that interface has been redesigned to use the SCC interface as well.

PowerBuilder 8.0 was launched in conjunction with the 10th anniversary of the product and, by all accounts, it has exceeded everyone's expectations (...and there was much rejoicing!). The enhancements in this release focus specifically on three major areas - the Web, EAServer integration, and n-tier development.

Have you written any wireless applications yet? If you haven't, you soon will be. If you read the estimates from the professional research firms and forecasters, you'll see they tend to agree that wireless advertising, and ultimately mobile commerce (m-commerce), will become huge industries in the next four to five years.

Professional Services staff and customers often approach me in the office and at trade shows seeking advice about interesting situations that need creative tools and solutions. One particular situation that comes to mind involves a very successful niche outfit recently absorbed by a larger organization in the same market.

Although the collapse of the Internet company bubble has slowed it down, technology is moving even faster than ever. Companies can't afford to rebuild old applications. There's just no time and not enough money to get a team of developers to rebuild.

In my last article in PBDJ (Vol. 8, issue 4) I talked about designing an UltraLite database for a scouting application that would run on a handheld device. The differences between the consolidated and reference databases were illustrated. This included the amount of records and columns needed.

I've run into many situations where I needed multithreading capabilities. When PB5 introduced Distributed PowerBuilder, I was thrilled. When PB6 enhanced this concept to incorporate shared objects, I was ecstatic. I quickly built several applications where multithreading made sense, even when the components weren't required to be distributed.

Lately when I've been to customer sites there is a constant theme: How do we get our applications into production using EAServer? Or another version of the same question: How do we work in a testing, QA, and production environment with EAServer? With EAServer 4.0 we have added functionality that will make putting applications into a product much easier. Repository versioning, an enhanced version of Jagtool, along with synchronization, provide a means to solving this problem.

I've heard it said that PowerBuilder isn't going to survive the competition from other software development tools. I, like many of my friends who are software developers, can't afford to ignore such rhetoric and I continually upgrade my knowledge of other languages. I'm impressed by Java and its simple way of doing some complex tasks and enforcing object-oriented practices when writing code.

In recent years the two-tier client/server model was reevaluated and a new concept built on scalability and maintainability was born: the n-tier application development paradigm. Leveraged by Internet popularization and the consequent growth of Web data-driven applications, the multitier model uses thin, pure, interface clients, middle-tier business objects installed on application/transaction servers, and database objects on RDBMS.

Encryption, the process of scrambling data so that only trusted parties can unscramble it, stops unauthorized users from using intercepted data or login information passed between authorized users and servers. Today, Web-based network traffic is encrypted using the Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) encryption standard.

As a PowerBuilder developer you're probably wondering how you fit into the world of J2EE. Is your boss saying, 'That PowerBuilder stuff is not compatible with J2EE'? Feeling a little left out of the whole thing? Well I bring good news. PowerBuilder fits wonderfully into the J2EE world.

Obviously there's much to be said about Jaguar. Many of the articles I read talk about how Jaguar can be used to leverage your PowerBuilder investment. Others I read explain how to use Jaguar proprietary components and features. Yes, Jaguar has many useful proprietary features, but does that make it a proprietary application server? Absolutely not.

EAServer is a component-based CORBA application server. That means it's built using a component architecture; Sybase made these components accessible, so just about anything the server can do, you can access and use.

EAServer 4.0 is the latest release of Sybase's award-winning application server. This edition simply adds to the features that currently exist in the 3.6.1 release. Unlike other vendors, Sybase has taken a radical approach to deciding which features should go into EAServer 4.0. We talked to you, our customers, and tried to implement as many of the features you told us you wanted.

This is the second of two articles describing how JP Morgan in London developed an XML interface between a Web-based bond trading system and one of its back-office systems. Part 1 (Vol. 8, issue 8) focused on parsing the XML file; Part 2 shows how to write an NT service in PowerBuilder.

Just when you thought you couldn't make your existing client/server application even thinner, we've got another technique for you. I enjoy writing these articles because I know there are lots of developers still supporting client/server applications that need to be thinned out. The funds to completely reengineer your system may not be available or maybe you don't have the time. These techniques I've been sharing are geared for just such a developer, one who wants to thin the front end while simultaneously reducing maintenance efforts. I've received some great feedback from readers who have employed some of my suggestions and I'm hoping this article will get similar results.

JP Morgan in London recently used PowerBuilder to implement an XML interface between a Web-based bond trading system and one of their back-office systems. This is the first of two articles that describe how this system was developed.

EAServer has a robust built-in security mechanism to safeguard your business components. Occasionally, it may be necessary to access a legacy security infrastructure to determine privileges or to log access. In those situations EAServer supplies a way to extend its native security system. This article illustrates how EAServer custom security can be implemented using a PowerBuilder standard component.

Whether your application was created years ago or is still on the drawing board, you can make it Web-ready. Planning ahead is not only a good idea, it's virtually mandatory in today's Internet world.

The changes in interface design, which have been extensive the past several years, have resulted in the addition of numerous controls to the traditional developers' environment. These controls have many options that can affect the usability and performance of applications.

The DataWindow object is the key to the success of the PowerBuilder development tool. Together, they've matured and developed, but even in the earliest versions, we were retrieving and displaying data from local tables into reports, lists, or data edit screens.

What's up with e-learning at Sybase? Our goal is to bring online, just-in-time learning solutions to our employees so they can reap the many benefits associated with online learning - including increased productivity, faster and better service to our customers, and faster time-to-market with our products.

It's well known that Sun Microsystems' Enterprise JavaBean (EJB) specification is an industry-standard, vendor-neutral, portable architecture for middle-tier transactional components. In an industry starved for standardization, both the server vendor and the development community have embraced EJB. Sybase is a leading member of the J2EE consortium. Sybase's EAServer version 3.0 supported EJB 0.4, version 3.5 supported EJB 1.0, and the recently released J2EE-compatible EAServer version 3.6.1 supports the latest EJB 1.1 specification.

On Saturday, August 11, and Sunday, August 12, choose from six pre-conference courses with full labs. For complete course descriptions, registration, pricing, and location information, visit www.sybase.com/tech wave2001.

In a correctly normalized relational database, the data reads downward. Indeed, as tables progress through the various normal forms, they become narrower and taller, with fewer columns and more rows. Nevertheless, there are times when it's useful to view data with a horizontal dimension in a matrix with 'data' values residing at the intersections between 'row' and 'column' values. Many software tools provide the capability to view data in this way. MS Excel has pivot tables, MS Access has crosstab queries, and PowerBuilder has the crosstab DataWindow presentation style.

PowerBuilder 8 is out now. And you're a developer using PB 7 (perhaps still using PB 6.5 or an even earlier version) and spending the majority of your time on 'traditional' client/server applications. You're asking yourself, 'Does PB 8 have anything for me?' The big new features in PB 7 (Jaguar integration, HTMLDW) were not something you could use, and you have about the same enthusiasm about PowerSite integration. Well, the good news is that there is a slew of new features in PB 8 for 'the rest of us.' Stuff that will make our day-to-day development experiences a bit easier.

Many PowerBuilder programmers over the last year have been spending most, if not all, of their efforts developing Web-enabled applications or distributed solutions - solutions that take advantage of Sybase's Enterprise Application Server.

In this article I cover the syntax for the new PB 8 exception handling, how to write the exception handlers that will improve your code, as well as issues concerning legacy code that currently implements exception-handling strategies.

One of the really neat features of the grid DataWindow is its ability to move and resize columns. This allows users to customize their view and make better use of the screen. Trouble is, once you alter the DataWindow and get it just the way you like it, the format information is lost when you close the window and reopen it.

PowerDesigner 8 recently shipped to production, and the new modeling features added in this release now enhance the tool to support the entire object-oriented analysis and design (OOAD) life cycle. During the last two product releases (versions 7 and 8), the development team at Sybase focused on bringing UML functionality to the tool and extending its usefulness as a development aid.

In the last issue of PBDJ (Vol. 8, issue 4) we prepared the ground for our JSP-JaguarCTS-PB bridge. In this article we code our n_hepekpbdj component and deploy it to JaguarCTS. This component will be capable of handling an HTML String or ResultSet. We then create a JSP page that calls this component, then list some of the possibilities for a JSP-Jaguar-CTS-PB bridge based on our experiences in building one for our Hepek Dual Architecture Framework.

In Version 6 of Sybase's Adaptive Server Anywhere (ASA) database, a new kind of table definition was possible - the Global Temporary Table.