web based application

[shaik.a]

hi all,

can anybody let me know is it possible to develop web based application using progress ???

 

[MaximMonin]

i used wsa + appsever + db server components from progress and flex as client (web service interface).
Check webspeed forum as alternative (client is also from progress)

also client part can be javascript (for example GWT) that connects to progress appserver.

 

[RealHeavyDude]

There is a bunch of possibilities available to you:

1. WebSpeed - this is product from Progress that allows you to stay mostly within the Progress environment. Nevertheless, you need to know web technologies like HTML, CSS and others. The WebSpeed Broker is a variant of their AppServer which returns an HTML output via CGI to the WebServer.
2. Any Java based technology ( I use Google Web Toolkit, for example ) for the UI. With the Java Open Client technology provided by Progress you can easily access the OpenEdge AppServer to fetch data from and store it into an OpenEdge database.
3. Any .NET based technology for the UI. The .NET Open Client technology basically offers the same functionality which is provided by the Java Open Client technology - in this case for .NET.
4. Any Web technology capable of accessing databases via JDBC/ODBC - but I would not recommend you because, IMHO of course, there is no value in keeping the OpenEdge database in such a scenario.

Personally I think WebSpeed is a little bit old fashioned and you need to get heavily into Java Script to get richness into the UI. Personally I don't like the .NET technology either because for my taste you depend to much on Microsoft and you are bound to the Windows platform.

As I am a humble guy just starting with the development of RIA ( Rich Internet Applications ) I explored the GWT and it looks very promising - and it's free. For me the best part of this combination of technologies is that I can have all of the business logic and data access in Progress OpenEdge technology ( where IMHO the strength of the OpenEdge technology lies ) and have the most fanciest of RIA without having to dive to deep into Java Script coding or being limited to what Progress offers.

Heavy Regards, RealHeavyDude.

 

[medu]

Well, while getting data from Progress database in any RIA frameworks available is not the hardest thing to do turning this in a productive development environment it's a whole other story. Implementing a customized RIA framework with 'common' functionality that exists in Progress like input mask validations, keyboard support to only name a few is something that one might experiment and we did that too at my last company (see quarix.net) but this is just too much effort to put into it and at the end of the day you still don't have a productive development environment as any Progress developer expects.

What I think it can be an option for a Progress shop for a full RIA application is the WaveMaker solution that offers a fully productive development environment backed-up by a extensive RIA framework, the only issue there is that they use JDBC for database access and in that case there really is no gain in keeping the OpenEdge database. What we try now to do is to implement a JDBC driver to go against the Progress ABL business logic hosted on AppServer instead of directly to the database, that way you can keep your existing business logic and write that in Progress ABL as you did before while being able to access it from any Java middle layer which in that case happens to be the wavemaker RIA framework.

Best regards,
Marian Edu

m.edu
keep it simple
www.ganimede.ro
medu@ganimede.ro