Re: For Christmas, I want

Your GHK seems to have a few misconceptions.

First, tables are hardly "ancient technology". The TABLE, TR and TD tags are still the best way to show and control a table of data (known as a Grid or DataGrid in most Rich UI circles) and are used by all of the major JavaScript frameworks for their grids. Evidently your GHK doesn't approve of things like the Dojo grid - I'd love to see an example of how they show a grid of data - particularly one with movable, sortable columns, which is what comes out of the box with EGL.

But if you're somehow morally opposed to tables (which I find odd - programming is about business decisions, not religious decisions, but for the sake of argument let's go with it), then the Grid layout is only one way of doing things. EGL allows you to use absolutely any HTML you care to, from SPANs to DIVs to your own custom HTML using an HTML object. I happen to be working on a complex UI with multiple collapsible panels with distinct right and left-hand sides. The left-hand sides are completely free-form, while the right-hand sides all line up (they keep running totals).

I did it by creating my own widget which has the common right-hand side components and then a DIV to contain the left-hand side. Since some these components can be indented, it takes some work to keep the right-hand side nicely lined up, but I do it using CSS. EGL is very, very CSS friendly. It's also very friendly to UI developers because it's quite easy play to create your own widgets. And those custom widgets can then be used in the WYSIWYG designer. I've never seen that level of customization before, and that's what EGL was designed for.

So, anyway, yes, you can use things other than tables for those situations where tables aren't appropriate. At the same time, there are still lots of places in business application design where tables are appropriate and EGL supports that as well.

Joe

One thing not to like, according to our GHK who really know HTML and
things related, is that is uses tables for layout - this is ancient
technology now.

Is there a way to change that to use DIVs, etc.?

Vern

On 12/10/2011 5:32 PM, Joe Pluta wrote:

Anybody who doesn't at least TRY this product is really missing out on a
great Christmas present, and a tool that could quite possibly change how
they develop. One language, multiple tiers, open source. What's not to
like?

For example, with EGL it's very easy to have two datasources open - and
thus, you can easily read from DB2/i and write to MSSQL, or vice versa,
with code like this:

get Customer from dsDB2;
add Customer to dsMSSQL;

Me likee. :)

Joe

That's good news on that front, for those who want to use this product,
anyhow!

Later
Vern

On 12/9/2011 5:12 PM, Joe Pluta wrote:

On 12/9/2011 5:05 PM, Joe Pluta wrote:

The free EGL does not have the EGL program call support. You can still
call RPG programs via a stored procedure or write your own Java class
(EGL is phenomenal about that). But have no fear, the RPG program call
is on the priority list for version 0.8.0! :)

Urk... of course I meant RPG program call support. The RPG program call
support is not there yet. But it's being worked on and it looks like
it's going to be a real improvement over what we have, hopefully
completely avoiding the "obscure magic EGL configuration file" approach.

Joe