Heard it through the Bit-vine - Notes and News about the products you use

by Tom Hebenstreit, Review Editor

Published 1998-11-01    Printer-friendly version

Welcome again to the Bit-vine: your connection to the world of Clarion news. Let me remind you once more before we get started… SEND ME YOUR NEWS! Got a tip? A scoop? Seen something cool? Talk to me! I'm always here: tomh@clariononline.com.

C5 News

Ok, the cat's out of the bag, though the box hasn't arrived at the door.

C5 Enterprise Edition has officially gone gold as of October 21 and TopSpeed is supposed to be shipping. C5 Professional, C5 Internet Connect and C5 Web Edition (Enterprise plus Internet Connect) will be arriving at the end of November. As I said last month, all the C5EE components (except Wise for Clarion) will be available as add-ons to C5 Professional so you could, for example, just purchase C5 Pro and the SQL Anywhere accelerated driver.

To get all of the official skinny, including official retail and upgrade prices, versions, release dates and more, go to http://www.topspeed.com and follow the link for C5.

As an aside, I don't think you'll find much of a delay between the release of C5 and updates to most third party products. There aren't any huge shifts (like the introduction of ABC) to stall them this time, and quite a few vendors have already announced their C5 versions.

TopScan is tops

Got another gem from Carl "Tips" Barnes regarding the new TopScan utility. TopScan, in case you haven't heard of it, is a new standalone utility which will be shipping with C5 (both EE and Pro). For you old DOS-oids, think of it as CSCN on steroids. It allows you to view TPS files in record or key orders, add/change/delete records, use a locator on keyed records, view and save the Clarion file definition, analyze the file, auto-size columns for display and lots more.

Speaking of which, in the 'lots more' category, my favorite is that it allows you to do mass updates on a file, including using a number of standard functions such as text manipulation (upper, lower, left, etc.), date/time, substrings and even conditional logic using the choose() function. I have already used that capability a few times in a new project and it works great. Oh, yeah, and to help you see what will occur when you run a mass update, TopScan shows you a 'before' and 'after' version of a record while you are specifying your update logic for each field. And, yes, you can distribute it with your applications if you want. Way cool, kids!

Back to Carl's tip. One final thing that makes TopScan much more useful that the old CSCN or the current IDE database browser is that, as Carl pointed out to me, it opens files in SHARE mode. That's right, you can use it even while your applications have the data file open. I've already found that to be extremely useful – I can watch what is actually happening in the data file while testing my application, I can create extreme records to test boundary conditions and error handling, and -most importantly- do it all at the same time. No more run the program, enter data, close the program, close the app, browse the file, load the app, etc., etc., etc. Smoooooth, as they say…

Sorry, though -- TopScan only works on TPS files.

Microsoft news: NT 5.0 is no more

Yup. NT 5.0 is dead, long live Windows 2000. Huh?

According to new info at the Microsoft MSDN site, they are dropping the NT moniker altogether. There will be multiple flavors of the renamed NT 5.0, with Windows 2000 Professional the equivalent of what is now Workstation. Server versions will be differentiated by the number of processors they can accommodate and amount of memory they can address. W2K (acronyms already!) Server is 1 or 2 processors, Advanced Server is up to 4, and Datacenter Server (a new product) will cover up to 16.

They also said they will soothe the confused by using a slogan of "Built on
Windows NT technology" with the new products. Seeing as how NT stood for "New Technology" to begin with, I guess their new slogan is really "Built on Windows New Technology technology". That should certainly keep everybody Happy happy.

Say, you know these guys are pretty tricky. If the much delayed NT 5.0 (oops! Windows 2000) ships in 1999 at all, they can claim that they are ahead of the name (and game). If it slips to year 2000, well, by gosh, that's its name, isn't it!

If you want to read more about this, check out the press release at:
http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/1998/Oct98/NT5.0Pr.htm

Hmmm, can anyone say "Windows 2000 Personal" as a successor to Windows 98? Probably won't appear until 2001, though. Then again, Windows 2001 has sort of a nice futuristic ring, doesn't it? ("Open the database files, Hal" - "Sorry, Dave. I can't do that")

Also, as a side note for all you current NT users, Microsoft has finally released Service Pack 4 (SP4) for NT 4.0. You know where to go to get it.

Other news

Not as much news this time, due to the short month (the last issue of Clarion Online was published less than three weeks ago) and the fact that everyone was waiting for C5 to go gold, but here are some tidbits and announcements gleaned from the TopSpeed forum and elsewhere.

By the way, if you see any products here that you would like to see scheduled for a full review in Clarion Online, DO let us know!

• If you have been trying to access Tinman Development's web site and getting errors, just be patient. They are switching their ISP and their site will be out of commission for number of days, according to Dominick (Tinman). The domain will still be the same: http://www.thetingroup.com. In another bit of news from them, they say they will have C5 Gold compatible versions of their DAS line of products out soon. If you need to contact them in the interim, you can reach them through their CompuServe mail account: 74541.144@compuserve.com.
• Steve Olensky has released a very interesting new product which provides OLE DB and ADO (ActiveX Data Objects) capabilities to Clarion users. Introductory pricing is $199. Full info, demos and more can be found at: http://www.olis.com/cw/ado
  Look for a review of this one in an upcoming issue of Clarion Online.
• From the inimitable Larry Teames: " In continuing the tradition of CPCS to provide updates on a timely basis, CPCS is proud to announce that * Creative Reporting Tools v5.10 for C5EE "Gold" * is now available for download from: http://www.cpcs-inc.com
  Current CPCS users should use their v2.25, v4.09, or v5.0x authorization codes to install this build." Note that CPCS now has a top level domain for their site.
• Sable Software has released an update to beta 4 of their CW Xref tool for Clarion Developers. Find out Which Files, Fields, Globals are not used in your App, and also see where they are used to see what the impact of a change may be. The Beta (which has a 45-day timeout limit) can be downloaded from: http://www.clarion.org.au/app-ref
• L3 Technologies has released beta 2 of their native dBase file driver (which looks like it has a lot of powerful features in it), and also has a full blown Paradox driver currently for sale. Visit their web site at: http://www.l3.u-net.com for complete info and file downloads.
• CFC Computer Consulting proudly announced their Win95 Sort Template: "This new product gives you the ability to sort on any column in the browse box (excluding Group field) the new version added support for Local/Global fields sorting. You can choose to move the sorted column to be the first column, Sorting can be done in Ascending and Descending Order, case sensitive sorting is available too, as well as the ability to identify fields that you do not wish to sort on." Don't know the price, but a demo with pricing info is available at:
  http://www.CFC-Computer.com/demo.html (note: put on sunglasses before going to this page!)
• The Moseley Group (makers of the DET and DEF templates) are finally back online after a long hiatus. Pricing and info on all products can be found at: http://www.moseleygroup.com
• Paragon Design & Development was (I'm sure) pleased to announce UltraTree Professional Edition version 4.2. for C4/C5 ABC. Lots of new features, and upgrade pricing is available for users of the original UltraTree. More info and a demo can be downloaded at: http://www.paragondandd.com/utprodx.htm
• Stealth Software has released a new product called 'Dev Monitor'. According to their announcement: "This indispensable new utility sits in the background and tracks your developments. It will log how long you spend in your templates, how long you spend generating and compiling, and even how long you test your EXE. This is all done automatically and without effort. So for the first time ever, you will be able to see how long you actually spend developing." They also say trial version will be available sometime soon. For more details, email Cliff Court at: cliff@topspeed.co.za
• Lodestar Software will be providing FREE upgrades to C5 versions for all current users of C4 products from Lodestar Software. This includes RPM: Report & Presentation Manager, AFE: Automated Fax Engine, NCR: Newspaper Column Reports and PNet: Postnet Barcodes. Check http://www.cwaddons.com or email them at: support@lodestarsoftware.com for details.

Can't beat that price…

One of the really nice things about using Clarion is the overall generosity of the user community. (Go ahead, all of you give yourselves a pat on the back!) Often, this manifests itself in truly useful templates or tools that the authors have made available to the rest of us for that most favorite of prices: FREE! Each month, this column features a handy free template or tool that you might want to add to your bag of Clarion tricks.

This month's freebie is:

Free Information!! Free Support!! Lots of it from all over the world!!

Yeah, yeah, I know it's not a template, but you should take advantage of it anyway!

And where do you find this treasure trove of pertinent Clarion information? The Internet, of course.

TopSpeed has radically reorganized and expanded the news groups on their Internet news server (tsnews.clarion.com), so even if you are currently accessing them, be sure to tell your software to update its list of topics/groups. If you don't do this, you'll never see the new groups and the world will pass you by.

For those who don't know how to get to the TopSpeed news groups, here is handy how-to list from Arie Rens of Aadvantage Software:

1. You need an Internet news reader. If you want to be able to access both CompuServe forums and Internet news groups from within one program, you can checkout Virtual Access (GO ASHMOUNT) which allows this (and also has the capability to act as a local news server on your LAN).
2. Add "tsnews.clarion.com" (without the quotes) to the news servers in your news reader.
3. Connect to this news server and get a list of the news groups.
4. Subscribe to comp.lang.clarion, and the topspeed.* newsgroups you consider relevant. The newsgroups starting with 'topspeed.' are only available from the tsnews.clarion.com news server, the comp.lang.clarion newsgroup is also available on other news servers, so you may want to check your own ISP

Other options for accessing news groups, which you probably already have, include Netscape (via the 'Collabra' module in 4.0x or in the Messenger Mail window itself in 4.5) and Microsoft Outlook.

Also, now that there is a specific Internet news group dedicated to third party products, many vendors (such as Mike Hanson of BoxSoft fame) are starting to monitor that group as well as the traditional CompuServe third-party forum. Looks like the party might be moving, people!

Next month: Who knows? You'll just have to come back and find out!

About the Bit-vine

Each month, this column will provide you with the latest in Clarion news, tips, rumors, freebies and basically anything else that seems interesting about the goings on in the Clarion world.

So, who determines what's most interesting? YOU DO!!

Are you a vendor? Let me know about new releases, updates, betas, product plans or anything else you think Clarion Online readers might want to know about.

Are you a user (and who isn't)? Drop me a line about any cool nuggets of information you come across, free templates or examples worth sharing, or anything else that other readers might find useful.

What do you get for contributing? Well, you'll see your name up in lights (phosphor, to be accurate) here in the Bit-vine credits. For especially useful bits, you may even win an autographed GIF of an official Clarion Online shirt or other similarly valuable prize. Come on, how can you resist?

Let me hear from you! The magic address isTomH@ClarionOnline.com

The disclaimer

Everything in this column is the sole opinion of me, the author, and does not necessarily reflect the views of this magazine, its publisher, or even Pootie the maniacal kitten monster. Don't bet the farm on anything you read here: consider it a starting point for your own inquiries and research. The point here is that this column is intended to both enlighten and entertain, and that in the fast-moving world of software development this month's truth (or product release date) is often next month's "oops, did I say that…?".

'Nuff said!

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Clarion Magazine ISSN 1718-9942