I am always being told off by i-technologists for quoting Picasso as having said that computers are useless. But I still love his reasoning: 'Because they can only give you answers.' Picasso, like AJAXWorld Magazine, liked questions. So we thought we would share with you what some of the world's leading rich Internet application pioneers are thinking may be the next questions that we need to see answered. From that, readers can themselves infer: where is AJAX headed next?

Since I'm in the middle of moving to a new city and need to get organized, I thought I'd roll a little application using SQL Anywhere, PowerBuilder, and Amazon Web Services to help organize my media collection. In doing so, I'm going to check out some cool features in SQL Anywhere, in particular, consuming Web Services.

In keeping with the longstanding SYS-CON tradition of being at the very forefront of software development with all its online and offline resources, SYS-CON Media & Events jointly today announced a double whammy, launching both 'Open Web Developer's Journal' (htt p://openweb.sys-con.com) and 'Open Web Developer Summit' (http://openweb.s ys-con.com) - to be held for the first time in New York City April 21-22, 2008.

I just wanted to acknowledge the tremendous increase in the amount of Blog activity that I have received over the past year. I think (and hope) that this is because many Sybase professionals out there have come to visit my site for latest information on the Sybase scene. Since I started my Blog in August of 2005 I have seen a steady increase in unique visits to my site. This whole Blog experience of course is Reed Shilt's fault. Reed is the development manager for PocketBuilder and started the whole thing off by opening his own Blog within PBDJ, then sending me an invitation to join him in this new venue. At that point in time, Blogging was a whole new experience for me and in fact, I had not even heard the term until I received Reed's email.

I asked what she did for a living. She said she was a software engineer working with SOA. I did not think about my plane ride much until I arrived in San Francisco to attend the SOA World Conference & Expo this past Monday and Tuesday. The first day of the conference as I walked into the hotel, guess who I saw? My friend who I met on the Turkish Airlines flight from Istanbul. What a small world, isn't it? Her company was one of the sponsors of the event.

This year TechWave 2007 took place at Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas. For those of you who didn't make it, the following is a recap of the events, with a couple of thoughts and suggestions thrown in. Officially the only thing going on Sunday was conference registration. However, there is a private TeamSybase/Sybase reception on Sunday evening where, among other things, new TeamSybase members are inducted. This year we added one new member: Roland Smith.

The EAServer .NET client is one of the most important features in EAServer 6.1. This new feature enables .NET to communicate with EAServer components using IIOP. It provides underlying marshaling support for PowerBuilder's WinForm applications with EAServer and it's also a way to interoperate between .NET and J2EE distributed objects.

It's been the bane of PowerBuilder development since day one. You have a DataWindow that contains one or more text blocks that, when previewed for printing or printed, span a page boundary. The result: the DataWindow incorrectly handles portions of the text. You may find some text on the first page that is repeated on the next page, or some text may be missing entirely, or the text may end up overwriting subsequent report objects. The bottom line is that the results are unusable, and it often takes a great deal of tweaking to get adequate results. The good news is that I found at least one method of addressing the issue. The bad news is that the path to get there was rather convoluted. This article describes both.

As I've mentioned previously, TechWave 2007 was (IMHO) one of the best TechWaves we've had in years. Nonetheless, there is always room for improvement. I've made some specific comments in my blog, but there are a few general suggestions that are the most important. Quite a few Sybase customers are large corporations or government agencies that have long approval cycles for travel.

Sybase has announced new Microsoft .NET Framework-based enhancements to PowerBuilder 11 and DataWindow.NET 2.5. New features for PowerBuilder include Windows Vista support, .NET Framework incremental compile capabilities, and database driver enhancements. DataWindow .NET 2.5 has been extended with the ability for developers to use Web services as a data source.

Sybase, Inc., has announced that it has won seven Gold and three Silver Mobile Star Awards from MobileVillage, a provider of market development and news services about mobile technology. The annual Mobile Star Awards aim to honor and promote the best companies, products, deployments, and leaders in mobile and wireless technology.

Sybase, Inc., has announced, in conjunction with Sun Microsystems and BMMSoft, that Sybase IQ powers the world's largest data warehouse implemented in history, as noted in the independently audited report. The benchmarks were achieved in large part due to the compression capability of Sybase IQ, a highly optimized analytics server not only for compression but also for query performance and lightning speed load performance.

Developers, database administrators, IT managers, sales professionals and executives from 40 countries around the world are meeting in Las Vegas this week for the annual Sybase, Inc., TechWave User Training and Solutions Conference.

Sybase iAnywhere was recently recognized by IDC as a worldwide leading provider of mobile middleware. The report, Worldwide Mobile Middleware 2007-2011 Forecast and 2006 Vendor Shares, measured Sybase iAnywhere?s higher revenues and market share-results that placed the company ahead of most competitors.

'The Unwired Enterprise is already a reality - now we are taking it to the next level, enabling companies to easily develop and deploy mobile applications that extend the reach of business-critical information to users on the front lines,' said John Chen, chairman, CEO and president of Sybase.

Sybase, Inc., a provider of enterprise infrastructure and mobile software, and HTC Corp., a provider of Microsoft Windows Mobile-based smart devices, have formed a global alliance. The companies are teaming on strategic business, engineering and marketing initiatives designed to deliver optimized Sybase iAnywhere mobility software on HTC devices.

AJAXWorld 2007 West will take place on September 23-26, 2007, at the Santa Clara Convention Center, in Santa Clara, California, and will offer a new dedicated 'iPhone Track.' Another dedicated track will offer a comparative education opportunity for conference delegates on emerging RIA tools, including a Diamond track on OpenLaszlo and sessions on Microsoft's Silverlight, Adobe's AIR and Sun's JavaFX.

05/26/2007 - TopWizProgramming announced that PBSearch was updated to support PB11 and to add several new features. www.topwiz programming.com/pbsearch. html

Can afford to take just one day off, get out of your cubicle and see what other people up to these days? Is J2EE still in favor? What's this ESB is about? Have you even heard of using Flex as a Web front end of your Java applications? Do not miss an event in NYC this Monday, that is created for people who think that they are way too busy to take several days off and spend them in the class. Just take one day off and attend the Real-World Java event. The discounted rate for this event is $395. To get this discount, enter the coupon code ?JUGgold' while registering

With the release of PowerBuilder 11 scheduled for 2007, Sybase will be entering the Microsoft .Net 2.0 world with their premier development tool. Some of our attendees at the October 11th OSUG meeting witnessed Mr. John Strano's overview presentation on PB 11 Beta. Again on January 24th, Chris Pollach presented 'Getting Ready for PB11.Net' with an overview of installing, configuring and building .Net applications with PB 11. Chris also disseminated some more code examples and his STD Framework for Winform and WebForm development.

Event-driven programming model offers an excellent architecture based on loosely-coupled components consuming and throwing events. In this tutorial I'll show how to design component that communicate with each other via events.

Starz Entertainment, a provider of premium movies along with flagship Starz and Encore brands, servicing approximately 42 million subscribers, selects Appeon to Web-enable mission-critical applications.

Discus Dental Software has announced that Appeon Corporation, a strategic partner of Sybase Inc., has successfully completed the first phase of migrating DentalVision dental practice management solution, built with Sybase PowerBuilder, to the Web and J2EE.

Appeon Corporation has successfully helped RES-Q Healthcare Systems to migrate key modules from its Labor Resource Management System, built with Sybase PowerBuilder, to the Web and J2EE. Ninety percent of the application objects and code were converted automatically, and the project was completed within 60 days.

We begin this article by asking the question: Why would you want to integrate real-time GPS data into your PowerBuilder applications anyway? After all, it's not likely you are going to connect a GPS receiver to your desktop computer and ask yourself where you are currently located. (At least I hope not!)

I am pleased to announce that Software Tool & Die Inc. has just released a new version of the SQLXtract utility (10.2.1) that reverse engineers Sybase's proprietary SQL format (PBSELECT) into ANSI, PL/SQL or TransAct SQL from the 'DataWindow' object. The new version of the SQLXtract utility was mainly revised to allow it to reverse engineer the source code from a Unicode based library vs.. an ANSI format previously.

The latest solution from Sybase iAnywhere provides developers with a platform for delivering Web-based content and applications to mobile devices rapidly and cost-effectively for online and disconnected use. M-Business Anywhere 6.0 new features include Web Services integration support, Asian localization as well as improvements in management, performance and security.

The debut of Xbox 360 marks one of the biggest consumer launches in Microsoft's history,' said Robbie Bach, president of the Entertainment and Devices Division at Microsoft and chief Xbox officer. 'With its sheer power, portfolio of graphically stunning games, rich online capabilities, and features for enjoying music, movies and photos, Xbox 360 delivers integrated digital gaming and entertainment experiences that simply can't be matched.'

iAnywhere, a subsidiary of Sybase, has announced that McDonald's Restaurants Limited has this week completed the roll out of a solution utilising its iAnywhere Afaria software.

Advantage 8.0 provides developers with the functionality they require to easily build scalable business applications with low administration requirements. Major new features include a newly designed Advantage Data Architect, replication support, online backup functionality and the addition of SQL scripting. These enhancements provide developers with the most robust, best performing, and comprehensive version of Advantage Database Server to date.

This year it looks certain that a new participation record will be set, more than 16,000 votes have already been recorded, as more than 20,000 SYS-CON Media readers are estimated to cast their votes in this year's Readers' Choice Awards.

Sybase, Inc., a provider of enterprise infrastructure and wireless software, has reported financial results for the 2005 third quarter ended September 30, 2005. Pro forma net income for the third quarter reached $30.1 million, or earnings of $0.33 per share on a diluted basis (EPS). This compares with pro forma net income of $27.4 million, or EPS of $0.29 for the 2004 third quarter.

Over the past few years, there have been a number of titles released on the Sybase enterprise database management system. Administrator's Guide to Sybase ASE 12.5, released late last year, was widely adopted by consultants, DBAs, and administrators of Sybase ASE.

Sybase has has broadened its long-standing relationship with IBM to help joint customers migrate to Linux for improved data management and business analytics. Under the terms of the agreement Sybase and IBM will bundle IBM OpenPower hardware with Sybase Adaptive Server Enterprise (ASE) Express Edition for Linux - the first time two partners have bundled enterprise hardware and software together for worldwide shipping.

Rainmaker Systems, Inc., an outsource provider of integrated sales and marketing services, has announced the expansion of its relationship with Sybase to include strategic lead generation services.

Computer Technology Inc. (CTI) has announced new conversion services for PowerBuilder-to-J2EE projects. The company says it can offer the benefits of J2EE with the look-and-feel of existing client/server applications, all at a significantly reduced cost and development time.

Although some folks were predicting a 'bloodbath,' the App Server Shoot-Out at Web Services Edge 2005 in Boston did not result in any serious injuries. Instead, Anne Thomas Manes, VP and Research Director at Burton Group, brought together representatives from a wide assortment of application server vendors for a lively panel conversation.

This year it looks certain that a new participation record will be set, as more than 4,000 votes have already been recorded in just the first seven days of voting, as more than 50,000 SYS-CON Media readers are estimated to cast their votes in this year's Readers' Choice Awards. Highlights after just one week's voting are as follows.

SYS-CON Media, the world's leading i-technology media company, announced that its 2005 Readers' Choice Awards polls opened today, February 1, 2005, and will remain open for six months, until July 31, 2005. More than 50,000 readers are expected to cast their votes to select the best software products and services of the year for Java, Linux, Web Services, XML, Microsoft .NET, ColdFusion and Macromedia MX.

SYS-CON Media (www.sys-con.com), the world's leading i-technology media company, announced today that SYS-CON.TV (www.sys-con.tv), the first streaming live i-technology television is scheduled to debut on February 15, 2005 to coincide with the first day of the upcoming Web Services Edge 2005 East - International Web Services Conference Expo.