Thursday, May 14, 2009

Clipper to Harbour - A Visual Tour by Pritpal Bedi

Hello Again

This time with an overview of visual tour depicting transition from Clipper to Harbour | from console to GUI.

Please note that this has been achieved with adding few more lines of code than channging any thing else. Also note that as my applications are dictionary based, i.e., data for every object, may it be input screen or selections or browsers, coming from data-dictionaries, I had to adopt the GUI interface at the minimum as executable has objcts only working on data not embedded in the PRG.

The objective of this artical is to provide insight to my fellow developers who are still starvng to enterthe GUI world and do not have enough time and/or means to other solutions.

1. The startup screen;

Clipper


Harbour + Gtwvg

The window contains a child window which hosts an AChoice routine foe selection. If you click on main window the titlebar of selection window flashes, a true parent child implementation.




2. Main Screen;

Clipper


Harbour + Gtwvg



3. Menu System;

Clipper


Harbour + Gtwvg

Every menu is presented in another window but applcation retains the same behavior that of Clipper, i.e., navigation with left-right arrow keys closes previous menu window and opens new one.




4. Data Entry Screen;

Clipper


Harbour + Gtwvg

This window is resizable by font size, i.e., when you resize, number of rows and columns remain the same. Fonts and GUI elements resized to relative coordinates.




5. Browser;

Clipper


Harbour + Gtwvg

NOTE; The icons depicted on toolbar of browser window are lifted from [ourXDbu] application. Marchuet, if you have any reservations please let me know, I will replace this icon set with my old one.

The bowser window is resizable with different attributes. Font and other GUI elements remain the same size instead rows and columns go on increasing/decreasing.




6. Only in Harbour;

Harbour + Gtwvg

This window is not resizable. It remains static because text fonts and picture has been tuned to this size only.




Hope it will be useful for you.

Regards
Pritpal Bedi
Posted by at

3 comments:

  1. Sudip BhattacharyyaMay 15, 2009 at 6:53 PM

    Hello,

    Many many thanks to CCH and Pritpal himself. Excellent documentation by CCH.

    One thing more. I must say that Mr. Pritpal Bedi is one of the best helpful "software inventors" I have seen so far.

    With best regards to all.

    Sudip
    (Student of "Student of Software Analysis & Design")

    ReplyDelete
  2. Sudip BhattacharyyaMay 16, 2009 at 6:18 PM

    Hello Pritpal,

    Thanks a lot for your excellent presentation in clipper4cch.blogspot.com.

    I like to know it detail from you. E.g., about data dictionary based development and some other things. Can you please share your experience and tips regarding this (in any place, may be CCH's Clipper ... Clipper ... Clipper forum)

    You may remember that I was testing your software tool (gtwvg library) about 1 month ago and learned many things from you.

    But, I faced some small problems.
    1. Size of executable file is very large (WRT xHarbour + gtwvw, HMG)
    2. Walert function has some problem in my style of programming (heavily depending on SAVE SCREEN, RESTORE SCREEN).

    (Some other problems, which I can't remember right now)

    CCH and I have discussed many times regarding this (how to use gtwvw in our existing clipper apps).

    And all of us (there are also many programmers) will be benefited from your guidance. And if you want to create a forum / group for gtwvg, I want to join with it.

    Thank you again.

    With best regards.

    Sudip

    ReplyDelete
  3. Lotus InfosystemsDecember 4, 2010 at 2:34 PM

    Pritpalji,

    Sat Sri Akal !
    God Bless You.
    Milan, Bhavnagar, Gujarat.

    ReplyDelete

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Welcome to Clipper... Clipper... Clipper


In 1997, then using Delphi 3, I had already created 32-bits Windows applications for HRIS, ERP and CRM. In 2007, using Ruby on Rails, an AJAX powered CRM site running on Apache & MySQL was created and I am now using Visual Studio .Net 2008 to create web-based projects and Delphi 7 for Win32 applications using SQL2005 & DBFCDX.

So, why then am I reviving the Original Clipper... Clipper... Clipper via a Blog as CA-Clipper is a programming language for the DOS world ? Believe it or not, there are still some clients using my mission-critical CA-Clipper applications for DOS installed in the late 80's and up to the mid 90's. This is testimony to CA-Clipper's robustness as a language :-)

With the widespread introduction of Windows 7 64-bits as the standard O/S for new Windows based PCs & Notebooks, CA-Clipper EXE simply will not work and it has become imperative for Clipper programmers to migrate immediately to Harbour to build 32/64 bits EXEs

Since 28th January 2009, this blog has been read by 134,389 (10/3/11 - 39,277) unique visitors (of which 45,151 (10/3/11 - 13,929) are returning visitors) from 103 countries and 1,574 cities & towns in Europe (37; 764 cities), North America (3; 373 cities) , Central America & Caribeans (6; 13 cities), South America(10; 226 cities), Africa & Middle-East (12; 44 cities) , Asia-Pacific (21; 175 cities). So, obviously Clipper is Alive & Well : -)


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This is the original Welcome Page for Clipper... Clipper... Clipper, which I am republishing for historical and sentimental reasons. The only changes that I have made was to fix all the broken links. BTW, the counter from counter.digits.com is still working :-)

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This site started out as a teeny-weeny section of Who the heck is Chee Chong Hwa ? and has graduated into a full blown web site of more than 140 pages (actually hundreds of A4 size pages) ! This is due to its growing popularity and tremendous encouragements from visiting Clipperheads from 100 countries worldwide, from North America, Central America, Caribbean, South America, Europe, Middle-East, Africa and Asia-Pacific. Thanx Clipperheads, you all made this happen !


What is Clipper ?

You may ask, what is this Clipper stuff ? Could Clipper be something to do with sailing as it is the name of a very fast sailing American ship in the 19th century ?

Well, Clipper or to be precise, CA-Clipper is the premier PC-Software development tool for DOS. It was first developed by Nantucket Corporation initially as a compiler for dBase3+ programs. Since then, CA-Clipper has evolved away from its x-base roots with the introduction of lexical scoping & pre-defined objects like TBrowse. As at today, the most stable version ofClipper is 5.2e while the latest version, 5.3a was introduced on 21 May 1996.

As at 11th November, 1996, an unofficial 5.3a fixes file was made available by Jo French. See the About CA-Clipper 5.3a section for more details. BTW, Jo French uploaded the revised 5.3a fixes file on 20th November, 1996.

Latest News

The latest news is that CA has finally released the long-awaited 5.3b patch on 21 May, 1997.

For 5.3b users, you must a take a look at Jo French's comments on unfixed bugs in 5.3b.

BTW, have you used Click ? If you're a serious Clipperprogrammer and need an excellent code formatter, Click is a natural choice. How to get it ? Simple, access Phil Barnett's site via my Cool Clipper Sites.

32-bits Clipper for Windows ?

Have you tried Xbase ++ ? Well, I have and compared to Delphi (my current Windows programming tool of choice), I'm still sticking to Delphi.

Anyway, you should visit the Alaska Home Page. Give it a chance and then draw your own conclusions !.

The Harbour Project

Is this the future of Xbase ? Take a look at at the Harbour Project

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